Time's Laughingstocks, and Other Verses Part 11

II

FORMER BEAUTIES

These market-dames, mid-aged, with lips thin-drawn, And tissues sere, Are they the ones we loved in years agone, And courted here?

Are these the muslined pink young things to whom We vowed and swore In nooks on summer Sundays by the Froom, Or Budmouth sh.o.r.e?

Do they remember those gay tunes we trod Clasped on the green; Aye; trod till moonlight set on the beaten sod A satin sheen?

They must forget, forget! They cannot know What once they were, Or memory would transfigure them, and show Them always fair.

III

AFTER THE CLUB-DANCE

Black'on frowns east on Maidon, And westward to the sea, But on neither is his frown laden With scorn, as his frown on me!

At dawn my heart grew heavy, I could not sip the wine, I left the jocund bevy And that young man o' mine.

The roadside elms pa.s.s by me, - Why do I sink with shame When the birds a-perch there eye me?

They, too, have done the same!

IV

THE MARKET-GIRL

n.o.body took any notice of her as she stood on the causey kerb, All eager to sell her honey and apples and bunches of garden herb; And if she had offered to give her wares and herself with them too that day, I doubt if a soul would have cared to take a bargain so choice away.

But chancing to trace her sunburnt grace that morning as I pa.s.sed nigh, I went and I said "Poor maidy dear!--and will none of the people buy?"

And so it began; and soon we knew what the end of it all must be, And I found that though no others had bid, a prize had been won by me.

V

THE INQUIRY

And are ye one of Hermitage - Of Hermitage, by Ivel Road, And do ye know, in Hermitage A thatch-roofed house where sengreens grow?

And does John Waywood live there still - He of the name that there abode When father hurdled on the hill Some fifteen years ago?

Does he now speak o' Patty Beech, The Patty Beech he used to--see, Or ask at all if Patty Beech Is known or heard of out this way?

- Ask ever if she's living yet, And where her present home may be, And how she bears life's f.a.g and fret After so long a day?

In years agone at Hermitage This faded face was counted fair, None fairer; and at Hermitage We swore to wed when he should thrive.

But never a chance had he or I, And waiting made his wish outwear, And Time, that dooms man's love to die, Preserves a maid's alive.

VI

A WIFE WAITS

Will's at the dance in the Club-room below, Where the tall liquor-cups foam; I on the pavement up here by the Bow, Wait, wait, to steady him home.

Will and his partner are treading a tune, Loving companions they be; w.i.l.l.y, before we were married in June, Said he loved no one but me;

Said he would let his old pleasures all go Ever to live with his Dear.

Will's at the dance in the Club-room below, Shivering I wait for him here.

NOTE.--"The Bow" (line 3). The old name for the curved corner by the cross- streets in the middle of Casterbridge.

VII

AFTER THE FAIR

The singers are gone from the Cornmarket-place With their broadsheets of rhymes, The street rings no longer in treble and ba.s.s With their skits on the times, And the Cross, lately thronged, is a dim naked s.p.a.ce That but echoes the stammering chimes.

From Clock-corner steps, as each quarter ding-dongs, Away the folk roam By the "Hart" and Grey's Bridge into byways and "drongs,"

Or across the ridged loam; The younger ones shrilling the lately heard songs, The old saying, "Would we were home."

The shy-seeming maiden so mute in the fair Now rattles and talks, And that one who looked the most swaggering there Grows sad as she walks, And she who seemed eaten by cankering care In statuesque st.u.r.diness stalks.

And midnight clears High Street of all but the ghosts Of its buried burghees, From the latest far back to those old Roman hosts Whose remains one yet sees, Who loved, laughed, and fought, hailed their friends, drank their toasts At their meeting-times here, just as these!

1902.

NOTE.--"The Chimes" (line 6) will be listened for in vain here at midnight now, having been abolished some years ago.

THE DARK-EYED GENTLEMAN

I

I pitched my day's leazings in Crimmercrock Lane, To tie up my garter and jog on again, When a dear dark-eyed gentleman pa.s.sed there and said, In a way that made all o' me colour rose-red, "What do I see - O pretty knee!"

And he came and he tied up my garter for me.

II

'Twixt sunset and moonrise it was, I can mind: Ah, 'tis easy to lose what we nevermore find! - Of the dear stranger's home, of his name, I knew nought, But I soon knew his nature and all that it brought.

Then bitterly Sobbed I that he Should ever have tied up my garter for me!

III

Yet now I've beside me a fine lissom lad, And my slip's nigh forgot, and my days are not sad; My own dearest joy is he, comrade, and friend, He it is who safe-guards me, on him I depend; No sorrow brings he, And thankful I be That his daddy once tied up my garter for me!

NOTE.--"Leazings" (line 1).--Bundle of gleaned corn.

TO CARREY CLAVEL