poet,
and with nothing else to do
But write the tender verses
that she set the music to....

[Illustration]

When we should live together
in a cozy little cot
Hid in a nest of roses,
with a fairy garden-spot,

Where the vines were ever fruited
and the weather ever fine,
And the birds were ever singing
for that old sweetheart of mine....

[Illustration]

When I should be her lover
forever and a day,
And she my faithful sweetheart
till the golden hair was gray;

And we should be so happy
that when either's lips were dumb
They would not smile in Heaven
till the other's kiss had come.

[Illustration]

But, ah! my dream is broken
by a step upon the stair,
And the door is softly opened,
and--my wife is standing there:

Yet with eagerness and rapture
all my visions I resign,--
To greet the _living_ presence
of that old sweetheart of mine.

[Illustration]

End of Project Gutenberg's An Old Sweetheart of Mine, by James Whitcomb Riley

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