The Happiest Man in I-O-Way
By Rupert Hughes
Jes’ down the road a piece, ‘ith the dust so deep
It teched the bay mare’s fetlocks; an’ the sun
So b’ilin’ hot, the pewees dassn’t peep;
Seemed like midsummer ’fore the spring’s begun!
An’ me plumb beat an’ good-fer-nothin’-like
An’ awful lonedsome fer a sight o’ you …
I come to that big locus’ by the pike,
An’ she was all in bloom, an’ trembly, too,
With breezes like drug-store perfumery.
I stood up in my stirrups, with my head
So deep in flowers they almost smothered me.
I kind o’ liked to think that I was dead …
An’ if I hed ‘a’ died like that to-day,
I’d ‘a’ be’n the happiest man in I-o-way.
For whut’s the us’t o’ goin’ on like this?
Your pa not ‘lowin me around the place …
Well, fust I knowed, I’d give them blooms a kiss;
They tasted like Good-Night on your white face.
I reached my arms out wide, an’ hugged ’em—say,
I dreamp’ your little heart was hammerin’ me!
I broke this branch off for a love-bo’quet;
‘F I’d be’n a giant, I’d ‘a’ plucked the tree!
The blooms is kind o’ dusty from the road,
But you won’t mind. And, as the feller said,
“When this you see remember me”—I knowed
Another poem; but I’ve lost my head
From seein’ you! ’Bout all that I kin say
Is—“I’m the happiest man in I-o-way.”
Well, comin’ ‘long the road I seen your ma
Drive by to town—she didn’t speak to me!
An’ in the farthest field I seen your pa
At his spring-plowin’, like I’d ought to be.
But, knowin’ you’d be here all by yourself,
I hed to come—for now’s our livin’ chance.
Take off yer apern, leave things on the shelf—
Our preacher needs what th’ feller calls “romance.”
Ain’t got no red-wheeled buggy; but the mare
Will carry double, like we’ve trained her to.
Jes’ put a locus’-blossom in your hair
An’ let’s ride straight to heaven—me an’ you!
I’ll build y’ a little house, an’ folks’ll say:
“There lives the happiest pair in I-o-way.”