Lines

By Robert Goodwin Olmsted

This book of poems is meant for everyone, although some of the poems are written primarily for children. These are interspersed with other poems some of which, it is expected, will be better comprehended by mature readers.

It is the authors sincere desire that the reader be as enthused by the contents of this book as he, the author, was in writing it.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Dec 7, 2005
• ISBN: 9781467034210

Robert Goodwin Olmsted

Robert Goodwin Olmsted was born in Manchester, Connecticut where he completed highschool thereafter to study at Lehigh University, Hartford Art School; the School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Boston and U.V.M. He has held a myriad of jobs of sundry sorts while traveling about the country and rendering portraits periodically as well as other realistic and abstract art to make a living. He has been hospitalized for mental illness but is now in good health. Late in his artistic career the author became interested in painting pictures and representing ideas with words rather than brush strokes. The last few years have been devoted in part to the occupation of writing poems, some of which are presented in this book

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© 2005 Robert Goodwin Olmsted. All Rights Reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

First published by AuthorHouse 11/29/05

ISBN: 978-1-4208-7073-2 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4670-3421-0 (ebk)

Printed in the United States of America

Bloomington, Indiana

Contents

Nature

Sweet Song

To A Hemlock

The Incongruous Guest

To A Daddy Longlegs

Under A Winter’s Topsy-Turvy Spell

Dependable Friend

Posh

Bread To Spare

Night Moth

Mother Earth Around Summer Solstice

The Would-be Visitors

A Special One

Fleeting Early Spring

Not Too Squirrelly

To Bare a Cross

Lines To An Ancient Oak Tree

Warning To A Worm

Good Signs

Spring

A Robin’s Breakfast

Romance

A Lady’s Labor Lost

While Off In Your Fastness

Left to Conjecture

All Is Fair

To Paint A Portrait

Now As We Part

Hardship

Homeless

Afflicted Some

A Lonely Roaming One

Hooker’s AM

Alone and Afflicted

HomeStretch

What Doesn’t Always

Happen On A Homeless Winter Day

HUMOR

Grease and Gum

The Bloke with a Bite

Trapezoid Pie

Red Fred

Taming Mr. Thinkle

The Pain Of Jane

Workaday Blues

Cigar Smoker’s Smile

Out Of The Pits By His Wits

Or

From No Pot To A Lot

Foggy Bog Stew

Relative Order

One Is Not Better Than None Or Than Two

Tragedy

Unbroken

On The Felling Of A Live Hickory Tree

Footnote preface to

The Witch, The Kids,and The Doomketch

The Witch, The Kids, and The Doomketch

Elegy for a Squirrel in October

The Hit

The End

Other Themes

Sprout Of Luck

A Fish To Be Caught

Barefoot in Favor of Tile

The Rhyme Of Bobby B. Blue

Excuse Me

A Message Found

Attitude

A True Devil’s

Cool Commentary

Betty Grable

Singtine

Pilfering Blackberries

You May

The First Snowfall

Salute to the U.S.

Skunky Skunky

My Jade Plant

Natural Acrobat

In The Frame Of My Window Sash

Bagger Bag It

Witch’s Pitch

Tune of June

For Sons and Daughters On Mothers’ Day

In Defense Of Artificial Flowers

If I Were An Elf

On The World Series Victory

Bottoms Up Boston

Pollyannaism

An Invocation For Trick-or-Treaters On Halloween

Halloween Special

The Wind and a Gnome

Two Decades of Lines To A Housefly

About The Author

About The Book

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Nature

Sweet Song

Solitary blackbird

Sitting in a tree,

Your sweet song I heard.

Was it just for me?

To A Hemlock

Comely hemlock decked with snow,

Who waits as cold bleak winters come and go;

As ever shelter ‘neath your boughs

Is found by chipmunk, bird, and mouse —

Refuge from the perils of storm

And safety when new life is born

Of animal and fowl which come to nest

Or when a limb you lend for short-term rest.

Given ears, a tongue and eyes to see

How enchanting might your stories be

Of glad happenings or times of strife,

Often leaving needed deficits of life,

Oh, worthy sentinel at forest’s edge.

But, then you’re really just

A simple comely hemlock tree

All decked in the forest’s hedge

For passers-by like me to see.

The Incongruous Guest

Some yards beyond my window today in the Spring

Was a sight which might otherwise have made me sing.

As we peered at trees with their chartreuse cloaks,

There atop the tallest of several large oaks

Was perched on a limb an American Bald Eagle,

Then somebody said, No! You’ve mistaken a seagull.

But with it’s large dark body and a crown of white

There could be no mistake as it abstained from flight.

Twenty minutes or more it stood regal and stern

Surveying the locale as for something to learn.

Spreading at length its great wings off it sped,

I guess, its notable grace to lend elsewhere instead.

Ask me: Why is a bald eagle showing up in this town?

I’ll ask: Why’s it ninety-eight before the month of May?

Perhaps