A CHRONIC KICKER
When the troops were under orders in our little scrap with Spain,
I was just a dub civilian “pounding brass” way down in Maine,
With a patriotic longing for a dangling, clanking sword,
Wasn’t quite what I expected, but the veterans of the war,
Said I’d surely be a Colonel if I joined the Signal Corps.

I was sick of running errands, sick of cleaning lamps and floors,
Sick of sounders, sick or relays, sick of everything indoors,
Sick of washing zincs and coppers, sick of renovating cells,
Sick of switchboards, sick of cut-outs, sick of answering the bells;
Sick of gossip at the counter, sick of smelling ink and paste,
Sick of counting greasy money, sick of doing things in haste;
Oh! Thought I, for just one battle, and to see the headlines say
“Jimmy Murphy, not the General, was the man who saved the day.”

First they shipped me down to Tampa, in a damned old cattle train,
Marched me sixteen miles to Lakeland- then they marched me back again.
With my haversack and carbine, overcoat and poncho too,
(Just to toughen me for Cuba, I was made an Irish stew).
And because I “cussed” the Colonel- for a month I made the “slum”
Peeled the spuds, and skun the onions, cleaned the sinks and damned
Things some.

I was rotten sick of Tampa, sick of getting up at four,
Sick of greasy smelling dishes, sick each time I saw it pour,
Sick of crowbars, sick of shovels, sick of axes, ditto picks,
Sick of spiders in my blankets, sick of fleas, and sick of ticks,
Sick of flies and dirty buzzards, sick of walking post as well,-
I was also sick of camping in a sand-pit close by hell.
And I longed to get to Cuba, just to hear the Gin’ral say,
“You’re a foine man, Private Murphy, come and lunch wid me this day.”

When I got my wish for Cuba, I was put to digging drains,
Cleaning cesspools, scraping sewers, with my hands and not my brains,
After which I steered a row boat, up and down Havana Bay,
With a crew of Spanish prisoners- finding out where cables lay;
And a fishing up between times, pigs and dogs, and drownded rats,
Rusty hoop-skirts, dirty linen, broken bed-springs and old hats.
I was sick of ugly Cuba, sick of every Spanish curse,
Sick of sodden, putrid corpses, sick of every gaudy hearse.
Sick of “garlic”, sick of land crabs, sick of all “con-carne” stuff,
Sick of Insurrecto swagger, sick of calling them on bluff.
I was sicker still of doctors, sick because they gave me pills,
When I knew that good old whiskey, was a better thing for chills-
And without a single headline, as to how “My active brain
Found the small electric button, that was used to wreck the Maine.”

Then they chucked me on a transport, and within a month or two,
I was holding down an office, in a hen coop in Cebu,
With a pistol on the table, with a carbine on the floor,
Two muchachos sweetly sleeping with a monkey by the door
Wrestling with a bunch of dhobie, sleeping like a poisoned pup,
Waiting for old “Canteen Salus” to butt in and cut me up.

I was sick of endless sunshine, sick of waving bunga trees,
Sick of rotten fish and roses, sick of shivers in my knees,
I was also sick of small-pox, sicker still of luke-warm drinks,
Sick of suffocating flowers, sick of nineteen other stinks-
Sick of lizards, sick of monkeys, sick of ant hills in my head,
Sick of palm oil in my coffee, sick of rice snakes in my bed;
And I didn’t long for headlines; half as much as just one sight
Of old frozen up New England, on a frosty, glistening night.

Then I served up in Alaska, and was shoved out on the line,
Where I couldn’t dig a post-hole, but for fear I’d find a mine,
I was put to boiling dog-food, where ‘twas forty-two below,
With a breeze from off the Artic, full of large, cold chunks of snow,
Which completely filled my “Glottis” like a dusty bale of hay-
And the nearest place to wet it, was two hundred miles away.

I was sick of inky darkness, shrieking winds and barren plains,
Sick of ice, and snow and tundra, sick of rattling window panes,
Sick of double doors and windows, sick of stuffy wood-stove heat,
Sick of dog-talk, sick of lamp smoke, sick of everything to eat,
Sick to feel the south-wind blowing, sick to see the grass grow tall.
So I took my final papers, (with the bottom torn away),
And I severed my connection with my friends the U. S. A.

Now I’m back in old New England, on a dirty railroad job,
Where the G.P.A.’s a loafer, and the manager a slob,
Where I put in sixteen hours every blasted livelong day,
And my board and clothes, and lodging eat up every cent of pay,
While the rest goes fro assessments to the Union, O.R.T
And I’m just a damned civilian, holding down a local key.

Oh! I’m sick to hear the bugles, sick to get back with the men,
Sick to see the same old faces, sick to grumble once again,
Sick to be out in the open, sick to be in one more fight,
Sick to see the silent torches flashing orders through the night;
Sick for guard-mount, sick for the re-call, sick to hear the sentry’s tread
Sick to roll up in my blanket, on the ground, instead of bed.
And I’d give my hopes of heaven, just to hear my Captain say,
“Murphy, you’ve been made a Sergeant, Here’s your warrant and your pay.

--By a member of Signal Corps, U. S. A.