TO ANTHEA, WHO MAY COMMAND HIM ANYTHING
(New Style)
Am I sincere? I say I dote
On everything that Browning wrote;
I know some bits by heart to quote:
But then She reads him.
I say—and is it strictly true?—
How I admire her cockatoo;
Well! in a way of course I do:
But then She feeds him.
And I become, at her command,
The sternest Tory in the land;
The Grand Old Man is far from grand;
But then She states it.
Nay! worse than that, I am so tame,
I once admitted—to my shame—
That football was a brutal game:
Because She hates it.
My taste in Art she hailed with groans,
And I, once charmed with bolder tones,
Now love the yellows of Burne-Jones:
But then She likes them.
My tuneful soul no longer hoards
Stray jewels from the Empire boards;
I revel now in Dvorak's chords:
But then She strikes them.
Our age distinctly cramps a knight;
Yet, though debarred from tilt and fight,
I can admit that black is white,
If She asserts it.
Heroes of old were luckier men
Than I—I venture now and then
To hint—retracting meekly when
She controverts it.
Alfred Cochrane [1865-