"Scotty" Bill

 

There's "Scotty" Bill, four score of years,

Who, every morning when we arise,

Will swear that summer's not yet come,

And questions us-" Where are the flies?"

 

His age, methought, unsettled him,

Yet still I felt some strange surpise

When, every day, he damned and raved

That summer had not brought more flies.

 

I asked a lodger-"Tell me why

Bill swears, and where his trouble lies."

"Old Bill makes sticky papers, and

He makes his living catching flies."

 

And Bill, he knows a thing or two,

For here he strikes the cursed cause

That robbed sweet summer of her flies-

"Tis those damn sanitation laws."

 

With better food, and half a home,

I'd back Bill for a hundred years:

Death failed to blow his light out thrice,

Expecting help from hopeless tears.