Cliff Klingenhagen

Children of the Night (1897)

Cliff Klingenhagen had me in to dineWith him one day; and after soup and meat,And all the other things there were to eat,Cliff took two glasses and filled one with wineAnd one with wormwood. Then, without a signFor me to choose at all, he took the draughtOf bitterness himself, and lightly quaffedIt off; and said the other one was mine.

And when I asked him what the deuce he meantBy doing that, he only looked at meAnd smiled, and said it was a way of his.And though I know the fellow, I have spentLong time a-wondering when I shall beAs happy as Cliff Klingenhagen is.

l. 5: “wormwood”; a bitter extract, from any of several aromatic plants of the genus Artemisa, used in making absinthe and in flavoring certain wines.