Poem by Eugene Gladstone O'Neill

A Regular Sort of a Guy

He fights where the fighting is thickest
    And keeps his high honor clean;
From finish to start, he is sturdy of heart,
    Shunning the petty and mean;
With his friends in their travail and sorrow,
    He is ever there to stand by,
And hark to their plea, for they all know that he
    Is a regular sort of a guy.

He cheers up the sinner repentant
    And sets him again on his feet;
He is there with a slap, and a pat on the back,
    For the lowliest bum on the street;
He smiles when the going is hardest,
    With a spirit no money can buy;
And take it from me, we all love him 'cause he
    Is a regular sort of a guy.

I don't care for the praise of the nations,
    Or a niche in the great hall of fame,
Or that posterity should remember me
    When my dust and the dust are the same;
But my soul will be glad if my friends say
    As they turn from my bier with a sigh
"Though he left no great name, yet he played out the game
    Like a regular sort of a guy."

1. Villanelle of Ye Young Poet's First Villanelle to His Ladye and Ye Difficulties Thereof
2. The Lay of the Singer's Fall
3. It's Great When You Get in
4. Even As a Child
5. Submarine

Print

1738 Views

Last Poems

To Russian version