From Rude Rural Rhymes by Bob Adams, NewYork: The Macmillan Company; 1925; pp. 35-36.
FEET
O when the day is near its ending,
With all its earning and its spending,
From shoes I draw my weary flippers,
Which all day long were tireless trippers,
And stick them into comfy slippers.
Then all my toes in joyful freedom,
Are glad to rest until I need ’em.
I love to raise them up in air
Upon the arm of some stout chair.
The blood which toward my feet was flowing
Now seeks my brain and sets it going;
All through my big, broad dome it climbs
And helps me write these Rural Rhymes.
When young I loved to go barefooted,
In summer seldom shoed or booted.
When spring came sweetly o’er the lea,
I yanked my stockings off with glee.
In shoes no more my toes would huddle
Till autumn winds froze every puddle.
Though scratched by all the thorns I struck,
Though nettled, bruised, and stubble-stuck,
I shed shoes early, always glad to,
And wore them only when I had to.
[36]
Those naked feet sought many a wood
On many a sightly hilltop stood,
Walked down the rows where corn was silking
And drove the cattle home for milking,
The pleasant pasture cowpaths kept,
But used some care in where they stepped.
All barefoot still I fain would scramble,
In spite of nettle, briar and bramble;
But now my foot, so slender then,
Completely fills a number ten,
And on the same, in shoes long dressed,
By tough, unyielding leather pressed,
Some toes point north and some northwest.
I freely state this in my verse
Because, most likely, yours are worse.
The only pretty feet, by Jabez,
Are found on statues and on babies.