At Worthing an exile from Geraldine G—,
How aimless, how wretched an exile is he!
Promenades are not even prunella and leather
To lovers, if lovers can’t foot them together.
He flies the parade, sad by ocean he stands,
He traces a “Geraldine G” on the sands.
But a G, tho’ her lov’d patronymic is Green,
“I will not betray thee, my own Geraldine.”
The fortunes of men have a time and a tide,
And Fate, the old fury, will not be denied;
That name was, of course, soon wip’d out by the sea,—
And she jilted the exile, did Geraldine G—.
They meet, but they never have spoken since that,—
He hopes she is happy—he knows she is fat;
She woo’d on the shore, now is wed in the Strand,
And I—it was I wrote her name on the sand!
VANITY FAIR
“Vanity of vanities, saith the preacher, all is vanity.”
Ecclesiastes.
“Vanitas Vanitatum” has rung in the ears
Of gentle and simple for thousands of years;
The wail is still heard, yet its notes never scare
Or simple, or gentle, from Vanity Fair.
This Fair has allurements alike to engage
The dimples of youth and the wrinkles of age;
Though mirth may be feigning, though sheen may be glare,
The gingerbread’s gilded in Vanity Fair.
Old Dives there rolls in his chariot of state,
There Jack takes his Joan at a lowlier rate,
St Giles’, St James’, from alley and square,
Send votaries plenty to Vanity Fair.