Written for my Godmother, Mrs. Lucy Dillard Tabb Okeson, of Norfolk, Va.

When I was one year old,

So often I've been told,

Dear "Ma Mie" sang to me

This cunning poetry:

"Mousie, pousie, wousie,

In the Boush Street Housie,"

And always from that time

I've loved to make a rhyme,

So if it be my fate