Med Poetry Healing through Words

The Old Doctor

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They’ve  got a new man down hyere

At Mason’s Cove, thet’s young

An’ got a heap o’ I’amln’

An’ quite a ‘ily tongue.

I’ve nothin’ no-way ‘ginst him.

But tell ye when I ‘m sick

I want old Dr. Milspaugh,

An’ I want him mighty quick!

He’s doctored all my fambly

For sixty year, ye know.

An’ when he could n’t cure us

He never told us so!

He never gave a case up

Like doctors sometimes do,

But let us die a-hopin’

Thet we was pullin’ through.

‘N’ most I like about him

Is that he never tries

New-fangled drugs upon ye.

Like some thet ain’t so wise.

No differ what ‘s your yailment.

He’ll give ye calermel;

Ef thet don’t work he’ll dose ye

With quinine fer a spell.

Thar ain’t no form o’ sickness

Thet ever showed itse’f

Inside o’ mortal critters,

Enj’yin’ mortal breaf.

But what old Doc kin spot It

An’ call the thing by name,

Like he was blood-kin to it

An’ knowed fom whar it came.

He’s hand-in-glove with fevers,

‘N’ when he strikes a sprain

He’s jest like he was sayin’

“Well, hyere ye are again!”

An’ even Death don’t feaze him —

He knows it, branch an’ roots,

So well ye ’bout ‘ud reckon

They both was in cahoots.

An’ bein’ he ‘s so po’rful,

Ef ever I’m took sick,

‘S I say, I want old Doctor,

‘N’ I want him middlin’ quick!

‘F my time’s come, naught can save me;

Ef it ain’t, why then old Doc

‘Ull fetch me round a-hummin’

An’ gritty ez a rock.

By: Eva Wilder McGlasson

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