--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Osmond, Alfred collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 25 number: 7 published: 1922-05 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: 'Alfred Osmond, "Weary Willie," *Improvement Era* 25, no. 7 (May 1922): 627.' source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera2507unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera2507unse start_page: 627 end_page: 627 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1922-05) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera2507unse publication_year: 1922 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1922, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # Weary Willie Weary Willie In the school of Dingle Valley, Willie was a perfect dream, With his tig, black eyes of beauty, And his cheeks of peachy cream; With a form that ancient heroes Would have worshipped as divine. On his face the stars of beauty Never ceased to glow and shine. And the mind of handsome Willie Had been cast in classic mould. Others were as lead and silver Are to forms of beaten gold. Willie Hess could always do it — When his highness deigned to try, And — this made us green with envy- He could tell the teacher why. Willie had a strong aversion For the baseness of the grind, And the sight of stern coercion Always shocked his noble mind ; Woe to him who tried to fetter That which Willie said was free — Rules and laws he burned to ashes, In his fires of liberty. But while nature made his body In a form that seemed divine, And bedecked his mind with flowers That would grace a sacred shrine, She could not without some effort On the pari of Willie dear, Lead him to the heights of learning That forever seemed so near. One by one the verdant flowers That adorned his brilliant mind, Dropped the beauty of their petals To the bleak and wailing wind. One by one the charms of person Yielded to the blight of crime, Till there hung a shattered picture In the frame that was sublime. There he stands, a loathsome beggar, Cursed with filth and foul disease, He whose bed was made of roses On a couch of lust and ease. All his beauty crushed and withered By the license of a lie, Still he hugs his phantom freedom — He can curse himself and die. Brighton Young University, Provo, Utah Alfred Osmond