'Twas not so many years ago, <br />Say, twenty-two or three, <br />When zero weather or below <br />Held many a thrill for me. <br />Then in my icy room I slept <br />A youngster's sweet repose, <br />And always on my form I kept <br />My flannel underclothes. <br />Then I was roused by sudden shock <br />Though still to sleep I strove, <br />I knew that it was seven o'clock <br />When father shook the stove. <br /> <br />I never heard him quit his bed <br />Or his alarm clock ring; <br />I never heard his gentle tread, <br />Or his attempts to sing; <br />The sun that found my window pane <br />On me was wholly lost, <br />Though many a sunbeam tried in vain <br />To penetrate the frost. <br />To human voice I never stirred, <br />But deeper down I dove <br />Beneath the covers, when I heard <br />My father shake the stove. <br /> <br />To-day it all comes back to me <br />And I can hear it still; <br />He seemed to take a special glee <br />In shaking with a will. <br />He flung the noisy dampers back, <br />Then rattled steel on steel, <br />Until the force of his attack <br />The building seemed to feel. <br />Though I'd a youngster's heavy eyes <br />All sleep from them he drove; <br />It seemed to me the dead must rise <br />When father shook the stove. <br /> <br />Now radiators thump and pound <br />And every room is warm, <br />And modern men new ways have found <br />To shield us from the storm. <br />The window panes are seldom glossed <br />The way they used to be; <br />The pictures left by old Jack Frost <br />Our children never see. <br />And now that he has gone to rest <br />In God's great slumber grove, <br />I often think those days were best <br />When father shook the stove.<br /><br />Edgar Albert Guest<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/when-father-shook-the-stove/
