- Published on
Far from the Madding* Crowd
It seems to me I’d like to go
Where bells ne’er ring or whistles blow;
Where clocks ne’er strike and gongs ne’er sound,
But where there’s stillness all around.
Not real still stillness - just the trees’
Low whisperings or the croon of bees;
The drowsy tinkling of the rill,
Or twilight song of whippoorwill.
’Twould be a joy could I behold
The dappled fields of green and gold,
Or in the cool, sweet clover lie
And watch the cloud-ships drifting by.
I’d like to find some quaint old boat,
And fold its oars, and with it float
Along the lazy, limpid stream
Where water-lilies drowse and dream.
Sometimes it seems to me I must
Just quit the city’s din and dust,
For fields of green and skies of blue;
And, say! how does it seem to you?
by Nixon Waterman
*Madding means ‘frenzied’ or ‘affected with madness’ and is often used in describing the behavior of crowds or mobs of people.
Nixon Waterman was born on 12 November 1859 in Newark, Illinois, United States of America, as the son of Lyman Waterman and Elizabeth Waterman. He lived on a farm until he was 20 years of age, teaching school during the winter months, and began his newspaper career at 21 years of age in the mechanical department of a country weekly in Creston, Iowa. Mr. Waterman was married on 14 March 1883 to Nellie Haskins of Menasha, Wisconsin. Weary of being a press operator, he tried his hand at other branches of the business, and made rapid progress. He first won flattering recognition as a newspaper editorial writer in Omaha, Nebraska. He moved to Chicago in October 1889, where he supplied the editorial page of the Chicago “Herald” with witty and catchy rhymes printed under the caption, “Small Change,” which were copied in publications across America. When the proprietors of the “Herald” started the “Evening Post,” he was one of the coteries selected to create for that venture the conditions of popularity with the public. After seven months on the “Post,” he went back to the “Herald,” but a year later resigned to work for “Puck,” “Truth,” “Youth’s Companion” and other popular weekly newspapers and magazines. Nixon Waterman was a newspaper writer, a poet, a book author, and a Chautauqua lecturer. His first wife Nellie Waterman (maiden name Haskins) passed on sometime in 1940, and in November 1940, he married Grace Sanford Leavitt. Nixon Waterman passed on at 84 years of age on 1 September 1944 in Canton, Massachusetts, United States of America.
It seems to me I’d like to go
Where bells ne’er ring or whistles blow;
Where clocks ne’er strike and gongs ne’er sound,
But where there’s stillness all around.
Not real still stillness - just the trees’
Low whisperings or the croon of bees;
The drowsy tinkling of the rill,
Or twilight song of whippoorwill.
’Twould be a joy could I behold
The dappled fields of green and gold,
Or in the cool, sweet clover lie
And watch the cloud-ships drifting by.
I’d like to find some quaint old boat,
And fold its oars, and with it float
Along the lazy, limpid stream
Where water-lilies drowse and dream.
Sometimes it seems to me I must
Just quit the city’s din and dust,
For fields of green and skies of blue;
And, say! how does it seem to you?
by Nixon Waterman
*Madding means ‘frenzied’ or ‘affected with madness’ and is often used in describing the behavior of crowds or mobs of people.
Nixon Waterman was born on 12 November 1859 in Newark, Illinois, United States of America, as the son of Lyman Waterman and Elizabeth Waterman. He lived on a farm until he was 20 years of age, teaching school during the winter months, and began his newspaper career at 21 years of age in the mechanical department of a country weekly in Creston, Iowa. Mr. Waterman was married on 14 March 1883 to Nellie Haskins of Menasha, Wisconsin. Weary of being a press operator, he tried his hand at other branches of the business, and made rapid progress. He first won flattering recognition as a newspaper editorial writer in Omaha, Nebraska. He moved to Chicago in October 1889, where he supplied the editorial page of the Chicago “Herald” with witty and catchy rhymes printed under the caption, “Small Change,” which were copied in publications across America. When the proprietors of the “Herald” started the “Evening Post,” he was one of the coteries selected to create for that venture the conditions of popularity with the public. After seven months on the “Post,” he went back to the “Herald,” but a year later resigned to work for “Puck,” “Truth,” “Youth’s Companion” and other popular weekly newspapers and magazines. Nixon Waterman was a newspaper writer, a poet, a book author, and a Chautauqua lecturer. His first wife Nellie Waterman (maiden name Haskins) passed on sometime in 1940, and in November 1940, he married Grace Sanford Leavitt. Nixon Waterman passed on at 84 years of age on 1 September 1944 in Canton, Massachusetts, United States of America.
1 Comments
I was blessed to have been taught by a teacher who loved poetry. I learnt some of Nixon Waterman's poems at school. My International poetry award is a testimony that there is a poet in many of us.
