Whittling Chips

Image from Elementary Sloyd And Whittling, by Gustaf Larsson – Publisher: Silver, Burdett And Company 1906. (chestofbooks.com)

Whittling Chips.

Chubby hands, so brown and small,
Wield the blade and scantling,
Chips, like driftlets, fly and fall,
Wasteful litter one and all,
In flakes about the bantling.

Seventy springs their seed have sown,
Still with knife and shingle
The child, a white-haired grandsire grown,
His life a dream, his memory flown,
Sits whittling by the ingle,

Yet the past held busy years,
Works of wondrous glitter,
But many a loss brought burning tears,
And many a gain regretful fears,
As best a useless litter.

And so methought the hopes and schemes
Of many a worldly witling,
When all is told, are idle dreams,
Mere chips of mortal whittling.

— DAVID GRAHAM ADEE

The News (Frederick, Maryland) Mar 26, 1890

Tags: 1890, David Graham Adee, Poetry