RILEY
Down in the water-meadow Riley
Spread his wash on the bramble thorn
Sat, one foot in the moving water
Bare as the day that he was born
Straight was his curling whiskers
Brown his body as an old tree-limb
Blue his eyes as the sky above him
Watching him watch the fish swim
Four solid sticks for walls had Riley
His roof was a rusty piece of tin
As snug as a pickling bush
He watched the seasons in and out
He paid no rate, he paid no taxes,
His lamp was the moon hung in a tree
Though many ache and pain had Riley
He envied neither you nor me
Many friends from bush or burrow
To Riley's hand would run or fly
And soft he'd sing and sweet he'd whistle
Whatever the weather in the sky
Till one winter's morning Riley
From the meadow vanished clean
Gone was rusty tin. The timber
As old Riley had never been