Sporting with Amaryllis in the shade,
(I credit Milton in parenthesis),
Among the speculations that she made
Was this:
"When"—these her very words—"when you return,
A slave to duty's harsh commanding call,
Will you, I wonder, ever sigh and yearn
At all?"
Doubt, honest doubt, sat then upon my brow.
(Emotion is a thing I do not plan.)
I could not fairly answer then, but now
I can.
Yes, Amaryllis, I can tell you this,
Can answer publicly and unafraid:
You haven't any notion how I miss
The shade.
Fifty-Fifty
[We think about the feminine faces we meet in the streets, and experience a passing melancholy because we are unacquainted with some of the girls we see.—From "The Erotic Motive in Literature," by Albert Mordell.]
Whene'er I take my walks abroad,
How many girls I see
Whose form and features I applaud
With well-concealéd glee!
I'd speak to many a sonsie maid,
Or willowy or obese,
Were I not fearful, and afraid
She'd yell for the police.
And Melancholy, bittersweet,
Marks me then as her own,
Because I lack the nerve to greet
The girls I might have known.