THE OLD FIREPLACE

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Jul 6, 1904

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 30, No. 27.

THE OLD FIREPLACE.

The blessed old fireplace! how bright it appears! As back to my boyhood I gaze, O’er the desolate waste of the vanishing years From the gloom of these lone latter days; Its lips are as ruddy, its heart is as warm To my fancy to-night as of yore, When we cuddled around it and smiled at the storm As it showed its white teeth at the door.

I remember the apple that wooed the red flame, Till the blood bubbled out of its cheek, And the passionate pop-corn that smothered its shame Till its heart split apart with a shriek; I remember the Greeks and the Trojans who fought In the shadowy shapes on the wall, And the yarn in thick tangles my fingers held taut, While my mother was winding the ball.

I remember the cat that lay cosy and curled By the jam where the flames flickered high, And the sparks—the fireflies of winter—that whirled Up the flue as the wind whistled by; I remember the steam from the kettle that breathed As soft as the flight of a soul, The long-handled skillet that sputtered and seethed With the batter that burdened its bowl.

But the fire has died on the old cabin hearth, The wind clatters loud through the pane, The dwellers, they’ve flown to the end of the earth, And will gaze on it never again; A forget-me-not grows in the mouldering wall, The last, as it were, of its race, And the shadows of night settled down like a pall On the stones of the old fireplace.

—Selected.