How long the homeward! And where was my arm?
(Crushed, crushed at her waist was the Aster!)
No one kisses me now—my winter has come:
(To ice turns fortune when once you have passed her.)
I long for the angels to beckon me home (hum)
(For dead, deader, deadest, the Aster!)
PINES AND SILVER BIRCHES
Doctor Bolles has very kindly sent me one of his later humorous poems. A tragic forecast of suffragette rule which is too gloomy, as almost every woman will assure an agreeable smoker that she is "fond of the odour of a good cigar."
DESCENSUS AD INFERNUM
When the last cigar is smoked and the box is splintered and gone,
And only the faintest whiff of the dear old smell hangs on,
In the times when he's idle or thoughtful,
When he's lonesome, jolly or blue,
And he fingers his useless matches,
What is a poor fellow to do?
For the suffragettes have conquered, and their harvest is gathered in;
From Texas to Maine they've voted tobacco the deadliest sin;
A pipe sends you up for a year, a cigarette for two;
In this female republic of virtue,
What is a poor fellow to do?
He may train up his reason on bridge and riot on afternoon tea,
And at dinner, all wineless and proper, a dress-suited guest he may be;
But when the mild cheese has been passed, and the chocolate mint drops are few,
And the coffee comes in and he hankers,
What is a poor fellow to do?