WHEN GRANDPA PLAYS

I DON’t know what makes Grandpa tired; he’s hardly done a thing Except to put some hammocks up and help us children swing; He only came an hour ago, and we’ve been here all day. He says we’re most too much for him and thinks he’ll hardly stay; He just played drop-the-handkerchief and blind man’s buff, but he Says, My! we’ve got him out of breath and tired as he can be. He says it’s most too much for him to play leap-frog and ball, But we have been here all day long, and we’re not tired at all! He started to play hide and seek, and first he had to blind And then he ran with all his might to see who he could find, And Tommy Watkins beat him in from there behind a tree, Till Grandpa had to give it up and say, “All’s out’s in free!” And then he sat down on a stump and said he’s tired to death. He had to hold his sides a while till he could catch his breath. He said he’d like to shake a tree and make some apples fall, But he’s too tired, and we boys here are hardly tired at all! He only ran in under once when we were in the swing, And then he had to rest because he’s tired as everything; And once he showed us how to climb a great, tall tree, but when He only got a few feet up he slid right down again. He said he used to climb a tree, oh, very, very tall And sit across a branch way up and never tire at all, But now he’s out of practice, and his legs won’t stay around The trunk, and he feels safer when he stays down on the ground! And sometimes when he goes back home and holds us by the hand, All wringing wet and out of breath, our Ma says “Goodness, Land! I think you are the youngest boy of all the boys in sight.” But Grandpa rubs his legs and arms and limps and says “Not quite!” And sometimes in the parlor, why, he says he was so strong When he was just a boy they used to take him right along To lift the heavy things and do the hardest work, you know, But now us boys ’ll tire him out in just an hour or so!