Читать книгу Hazards - Wilfrid Wilson Gibson - Страница 26

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From a deep pit of sleep

I rose, disgruntled, to let in the sweep

Who rattled loudly at the kitchen door;

And shuffling, slippered, down the stair,

Shivering in the nippy air,

Switched on the light

And turned the key,

And saw him standing there,

His black face gleaming in the glare

Against the tardy tarrying winter night:

When through the grime his smile broke merrily

As sunshine through a thundercloud, and he

Wished me “Good morning!”

Wished me “Good morning!”Back to bed I crept,

To snuggle once again

Beneath the counterpane

Among warm cosy blankets, while he swept:

And as I lay

Awaiting day,

I wondered, if it had devolved on me,

The job of sweeping others’ chimneys clean,

So that their hearthfires might burn cheerily,

If ever I’d have been

So single-hearted that all men might see

Through soot and grime the flame of life in me

Burning with such a crystal clarity.