Sonnets to a Shoemaker

THE cobbler’s always cheerful, though
His path of life be crost,
He does not tear his hair in woe,
Whene’er his all is lost.

He welts a lot, but not the wife
With whom his lot is cast;
She’ll find him, whatsoe’er their strife,
Still faithful to the last.

Onward his motto, aye, he strives
To grasp some other feat,
And in the dullest times contrives
Somehow to make ends meet.

The world may smite him without cause,
He never shuns its whacks,
And seldom grumbles at the laws
That regulate his tax.

We know but little of the good
His many acts reveal—
Were he ’midst madmen, why, he would
Their understandings heal.

And a much higher motive yet
His generous heart controls,
You would not see that saint forget
Their perishable souls.