The Life of the Party

When Roscoe Arbuckle was star in “The Life of the Party,” the film adapted from Irving Cobb’s Saturday Evening Post yarn, little did he realize that he would play a similar role in real life. Poet Gordon tells about it in these verses.

By R. C. Gordon.

A certain film comedian, who gave the world much fun,

Whose actual weight in flesh and bones is somewhere near a ton,

Thought he, too, should laugh a bit, and have a little play;

His chosen date, so I am told, was on last Labor Day.

He sent out invitations to his numerous actor friends,

And said if thou wouldst have some fun, wilst thou then attend?

Attend they did, and fun they had, and everything went well

Until one girl, from a nearby room, from pains began to yell.

“Roscoe hurt me badly, I can hardly get my breath,”

But the drunks paid no attention—they had no thought of death.

She asked them for a doctor and still they paid no mind,

Fun was on the rampage, the late pajama kind.

“They’re drinking up my liquor,” is the only thing he said,

And tried hard not to flicker when he found out she was dead.

Now in his cell he sits and moans and possibly might pray,

For he was “The Life of the Party” in his orgy Labor Day.

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