A FEEL IN THE CHRIS’MAS-AIR

They’s a kind o’ feel in the air, to me. 
    When the Chris’mas-times sets in. 
That’s about as much of a mystery
  As ever I’ve run ag’in!—­
Fer instunce, now, whilse I gain in weight
  And gineral health, I swear
They’s a goneness somers I can’t quite state—­
  A kind o’ feel in the air.

[Illustration]

They’s a feel in the Chris’mas-air goes right
  To the spot where a man lives at!—­
It gives a feller a’ appetite—­
  They ain’t no doubt about that!—­
And yit they’s somepin’—­I don’t know what—­
  That follers me, here and there,
And ha’nts and worries and spares me not—­
  A kind o’ feel in the air!

They’s a feel, as I say, in the air that’s jest
  As blame-don sad as sweet!—­
In the same ra-sho as I feel the best
  And am spryest on my feet,
They’s allus a kind o’ sort of a’ ache
  That I can’t lo-cate no-where;—­
But it comes with Chris’mas, and no mistake!—­
  A kind o’ feel in the air.

Is it the racket the childern raise?—­
  W’y, no!—­God bless ’em!—­no!—­
Is it the eyes and the cheeks ablaze—­
  Like my own wuz, long ago?—­
Is it the bleat o’ the whistle and beat
  O’ the little toy-drum and blare
O’ the horn?—­No! no!—­it is jest the sweet—­
  The sad-sweet feel in the air.

[Illustration]

AS CREATED

There’s a space for good to bloom in
  Every heart of man or woman,—­
And however wild or human,
  Or however brimmed with gall,
Never heart may beat without it;
And the darkest heart to doubt it
Has something good about it
                       After all.

[Illustration]

WHERE-AWAY

O the Lands of Where-Away! 
Tell us—­tell us—­where are they? 
Through the darkness and the dawn
We have journeyed on and on—­
From the cradle to the cross—­
From possession unto loss.—­
Seeking still, from day to day,
For the Lands of Where-Away.

When our baby-feet were first
Planted where the daisies burst,
And the greenest grasses grew
In the fields we wandered through,—­
On, with childish discontent,
Ever on and on we went,
Hoping still to pass, some day,
O’er the verge of Where-Away.

Roses laid their velvet lips
On our own, with fragrant sips;
But their kisses held us not,
All their sweetness we forgot;—­
Though the brambles in our track
Plucked at us to hold us back—­
“Just ahead,” we used to say,
“Lie the Lands of Where-Away.”

Children at the pasture-bars,
Through the dusk, like glimmering stars,
Waved their hands that we should bide
With them over eventide;
Down the dark their voices failed
Falteringly, as they hailed,
And died into yesterday—­
Night ahead and—­Where-Away?