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<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=508820" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>The Pencil Seller</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">A pencil, sir; a penny -- won't you buy?<br>I'm cold and wet and tired, a sorry plight;<br>Don't turn your back, sir; take one just to try;<br>I haven't made a single sale to-night.<br>Oh, thank you, sir; but take the pencil too;<br>I'm not a beggar, I'm a business man.<br>Pencils I deal in, red and black and blue;<br>It's hard, but still I do the best I can.<br>Most days I make enough to pay for bread,<br>A cup o' coffee, stretching room at night.<br>One needs so little -- to be warm and fed,<br>A hole to kennel in -- oh, one's all right . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Excuse me, you're a painter, are you not?<br>I saw you looking at that dealer's show,<br>The croûtes he has for sale, a shabby lot --<br>What do I know of Art? What do I know . . .<br>Well, look! That David Strong so well displayed,<br>"White Sorcery" it's called, all gossamer,<br>And pale moon-magic and a dancing maid<br>(You like the little elfin face of her?) --<br>That's good; but still, the picture as a whole,<br>The values, -- Pah! He never painted worse;<br>Perhaps because his fire was lacking coal,<br>His cupboard bare, no money in his purse.<br>Perhaps . . . they say he labored hard and long,<br>And see now, in the harvest of his fame,<br>When round his pictures people gape and throng,<br>A scurvy dealer sells this on his name.<br>A wretched rag, wrung out of want and woe;<br>A soulless daub, not David Strong a bit,<br>Unworthy of his art. . . . How should I know?<br>How should I know? I'm Strong -- I painted it.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">There now, I didn't mean to let that out.<br>It came in spite of me -- aye, stare and stare.<br>You think I'm lying, crazy, drunk, no doubt --<br>Think what you like, it's neither here nor there.<br>It's hard to tell so terrible a truth,<br>To gain to glory, yet be such as I.<br>It's true; that picture's mine, done in my youth,<br>Up in a garret near the Paris sky.<br>The child's my daughter; aye, she posed for me.<br>That's why I come and sit here every night.<br>The painting's bad, but still -- oh, still I see<br>Her little face all laughing in the light.<br>So now you understand. -- I live in fear<br>Lest one like you should carry it away;<br>A poor, pot-boiling thing, but oh, how dear!<br>"Don't let them buy it, pitying God!" I pray!<br>And hark ye, sir -- sometimes my brain's awhirl.<br>Some night I'll crash into that window pane<br>And snatch my picture back, my little girl,<br>And run and run. . . .<br> &n bsp; &nb sp; &nbs p; <br>I 'm talking wild again;<br>A crab can't run. I'm crippled, withered, lame,<br>Palsied, as good as dead all down one side.<br>No warning had I when the evil came:<br>It struck me down in all my strength and pride.<br>Triumph was mine, I thrilled with perfect power;<br>Honor was mine, Fame's laurel touched my brow;<br>Glory was mine -- within a little hour<br>I was a god and . . . what you find me now.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">My child, that little, laughing girl you see,<br>She was my nurse for all ten weary years;<br>Her joy, her hope, her youth she gave for me;<br>Her very smiles were masks to hide her tears.<br>And I, my precious art, so rich, so rare,<br>Lost, lost to me -- what could my heart but break!<br>Oh, as I lay and wrestled with despair,<br>I would have killed myself but for her sake. . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">By luck I had some pictures I could sell,<br>And so we fought the wolf back from the door;<br>She painted too, aye, wonderfully well.<br>We often dreamed of brighter days in store.<br>And then quite suddenly she seemed to fail;<br>I saw the shadows darken round her eyes.<br>So tired she was, so sorrowful, so pale,<br>And oh, there came a day she could not rise.<br>The doctor looked at her; he shook his head,<br>And spoke of wine and grapes and Southern air:<br>"If you can get her out of this," he said,<br>"She'll have a fighting chance with proper care."</div><div style="margin:10px 0">"With proper care!" When he had gone away,<br>I sat there, trembling, twitching, dazed with grief.<br>Under my old and ragged coat she lay,<br>Our room was bare and cold beyond belief.<br>"Maybe," I thought, "I still can paint a bit,<br>Some lilies, landscape, anything at all."<br>Alas! My brush, I could not steady it.<br>Down from my fumbling hand I let it fall.<br>"With proper care" -- how could I give her that,<br>Half of me dead? . . . I crawled down to the street.<br>Cowering beside the wall, I held my hat<br>And begged of every one I chanced to meet.<br>I got some pennies, bought her milk and bread,<br>And so I fought to keep the Doom away;<br>And yet I saw with agony of dread<br>My dear one sinking, sinking day by day.<br>And then I was awakened in the night:<br>"Please take my hands, I'm cold," I heard her sigh;<br>And soft she whispered, as she held me tight:<br>"Oh daddy, we've been happy, you and I!"<br>I do not think she suffered any pain,<br>She breathed so quietly . . . but though I tried,<br>I could not warm her little hands again:<br>And so there in the icy dark she died. . . .<br>The dawn came groping in with fingers gray<br>And touched me, sitting silent as a stone;<br>I kissed those piteous lips, as cold as clay --<br>I did not cry, I did not even moan.<br>At last I rose, groped down the narrow stair;<br>An evil fog was oozing from the sky;<br>Half-crazed I stumbled on, I knew not where,<br>Like phantoms were the folks that passed me by.<br>How long I wandered thus I do not know,<br>But suddenly I halted, stood stock-still --<br>Beside a door that spilled a golden glow<br>I saw a name, my name, upon a bill.<br>"A Sale of Famous Pictures," so it read,<br>"A Notable Collection, each a gem,<br>Distinguished Works of Art by painters dead."<br>The folks were going in, I followed them.<br>I stood upon the outskirts of the crowd,<br>I only hoped that none might notice me.<br>Soon, soon I heard them call my name aloud:<br>"A `David Strong', his Fete in Brittany."<br>(A brave big picture that, the best I've done,<br>It glowed and kindled half the hall away,<br>With all its memories of sea and sun,<br>Of pipe and bowl, of joyous work and play.<br>I saw the sardine nets blue as the sky,<br>I saw the nut-brown fisher-boats put out.)<br>"Five hundred pounds!" rapped out a voice near by;<br>"Six hundred!" "Seven!" "Eight!" And then a shout:<br>"A thousand pounds!" Oh, how I thrilled to hear!<br>Oh, how the bids went up by leaps, by bounds!<br>And then a silence; then the auctioneer:<br>"It's going! Going! Gone! Three thousand pounds!"<br>Three thousand pounds! A frenzy leapt in me.<br>"That picture's mine," I cried; "I'm David Strong.<br>I painted it, this famished wretch you see;<br>I did it, I, and sold it for a song.<br>And in a garret three small hours ago<br>My daughter died for want of Christian care.<br>Look, look at me! . . . Is it to mock my woe<br>You pay three thousand for my picture there?" . . .</div><div style="margin:10px 0">O God! I stumbled blindly from the hall;<br>The city crashed on me, the fiendish sounds<br>Of cruelty and strife, but over all<br>"Three thousand pounds!" I heard; "Three thousand pounds!"</div><div style="margin:10px 0">There, that's my story, sir; it isn't gay.<br>Tales of the Poor are never very bright . . .<br>You'll look for me next time you pass this way . . .<br>I hope you'll find me, sir; good-night, good-night.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=Robert+William+Service">Robert William Service</a><div class=q> <img src="https://www.citatepedia.ro/g/32share.png" style="float:left" alt="Share"> <script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=508820" data-title="The Pencil Seller de Robert William Service" data-description="A pencil, sir; a penny -- won't you buy? I'm cold and wet and tired, a sorry plight; Don't turn your back, sir; take one just to try; I haven't made a single sale to-night. Oh, thank you, sir; but take the pencil too; I'm not a beggar, I'm a busin..."></div> </div> </div>
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