The Scottie Puppy by Ella D. Farrar

THE SCOTTIE PUPPY
The world is large, and he is very small;
Yet in him dwells no awe or fear at all.
On the high road, where flash the motors dread,
He squats, to scratch his foolish little head.
Nor, though he deprecates with tail and grin,
Feels gratitude to you who risked your skin.
But lurches, with gay and aimless sprawl,
Betwixt the stranger's legs and makes him fall.
Chastised, he stoops your noble boots to lick,
And learns that blacking, through full sweet, makes sick.
Cramful of faults, a blunt-nosed rogue and thief,
He steels your heart as surely as your beef.
And, should the fates untimely snip his thread,
You'll wish they'd severed many a man's instead.
-ELLA D. FARRAR
Hemel Hempstead, England