Of gardens where beneath the vines and trees
One might sip beer and be consoled
By music mixed with talk, behold
The summer’s devotees
About the tables, idling June away.
And you knew chicory and cress,
With French or Mayonnaise could dress
A salad, growing gay
As you poured Burgundy or Rhenish wine,
Or had a sirloin brought to see
If it were ripe, the recipe
For broiling it, to dine
Thereon in fitting state, the waiter took
And bowed in admiration, then
You snapped your silver case again
And from the holders shook
Such cigarettes as Turkish grandees smoke,
And blew the perfumed incense forth,
Descanting on our life, the worth
Of lawyers, noted folk:
Of judges, politicians, governors,
Until the dinner came at last.
And there amid the rich repast
We poor solicitors
Gloried in life, and ruddy faced would laugh
At any mishap, any fate
That we could fancy might await,
And glorying would quaff
Incredible goblets of the quickening juice,
With blackest coffee topping all,
And afterwards a cordial—
Nothing we could abuse
And nothing hurt us, Edward! It was well
We lived, I think, and memories stored:
For now I am a little bored
With the invariable
And settled round of nights and days wherein
I must have sleep to work, and keep
Abstemious to work and sleep—
While you long since have been
The tangled lion of a woman’s hair
Who reads you novels and the news,
And mends you, tends you, even brews
Your broth and gives you care
In these dyspeptic mornings. As for me
The cafés, gardens haunt me yet.
I go about as one who can’t forget
A dead felicity—