THE TANGLED SKEIN
Try we life-long, we can never
Straighten out life’s tangled skein,
Why should we, in vain endeavour,
Guess and guess and guess again?
Life’s a pudding full of plums
Care’s a canker that benumbs.
Wherefore waste our elocution
On impossible solution?
Life’s a pleasant institution,
Let us take it as it comes!
Set aside the dull enigma,
We shall guess it all too soon;
Failure brings no kind of stigma—
Dance we to another tune!
String the lyre and fill the cup,
Lest on sorrow we should sup;
Hop and skip to Fancy’s fiddle,
Hands across and down the middle—
Life’s perhaps the only riddle
That we shrink from giving up!
MY LADY
Bedecked in fashion trim,
With every curl a-quiver;
Or leaping, light of limb,
O’er rivulet and river;
Or skipping o’er the lea
On daffodil and daisy;
Or stretched beneath a tree,
All languishing and lazy;
Whatever be her mood—
Be she demurely prude
Or languishingly lazy—
My lady drives me crazy!
In vain her heart is wooed,
Whatever be her mood!
What profit should I gain
Suppose she loved me dearly?
Her coldness turns my brain
To verge of madness merely.
Her kiss—though, Heaven knows,
To dream of it were treason—
Would tend, as I suppose,
To utter loss of reason!
My state is not amiss;
I would not have a kiss
Which, in or out of season,
Might tend to loss of reason:
What profit in such bliss?
A fig for such a kiss!
ONE AGAINST THE WORLD
It’s my opinion—though I own
In thinking so I’m quite alone—
In some respects I’m but a fright.
You like my features, I suppose?
I’m disappointed with my nose:
Some rave about it—perhaps they’re right.
My figure just sets off a fit;
But when they say it’s exquisite
(And they do say so), that’s too strong.
I hope I’m not what people call
Opinionated! After all,
I’m but a goose, and may be wrong!
When charms enthral
There’s some excuse
For measures strong;
And after all
I’m but a goose,
And may be wrong!
My teeth are very neat, no doubt;
But after all they may fall out:
I think they will—some think they won’t.
My hands are small, as you may see,
But not as small as they might be,
At least, I think so—others don’t.
But there, a girl may preach and prate
From morning six to evening eight,
And never stop to dine,
When all the world, although misled,
Is quite agreed on any head—
And it is quite agreed on mine!