Guy Wetmore Carryl: Verses about Power

I knew when first I looked into her eyes,
And she in mine, that what has been must be,
And so let others say she told them lies:
She told no lie to me!
She spoke me fair, of lees as well as wine,
Then, with that subtlest charm of all her charms,
Half-dropped her languid lids, and at the sign
I ran into her arms!

Now it is she who flings my window wide
At dawn, and lets the perfumed morning in,
And she who walks so softly at my side,
Through noonday's dust and din.
But, most of all, 't is she, where blue night falls,
Whose firm, imperious fingers tap the pane,
And she whose velvet voice it is that calls,
Nor calls her own in vain!

It is as if the siren understood
How that she is so strong at this still hour,
That I could not repulse her if I would,
Nor would, had I the power:
As if she knew that, should I try to check
The strength of that enrapt, responsive thrill,
Let her but slide her arm about my neck,
And I obey her will!

So, when she speaks, I answer; when she woos,
Her voice, like wine, the slow pulse goads and spurs:
I go to meet her through the dropping dews,
And lean my lips to hers.
All the long hours run laughing into one
The strange, sweet moment when the evening falls
And, like a mother summoning her son,
Resistless Paris calls!

A Boston man an ulster had,
An ulster with a cape that fluttered:
It smacked his face, and made him mad,
And polyglot remarks he uttered:
'I bought it at a bargain,' said he,
'I'm tired of the thing already.'

The wind that chanced to blow that day
Was easterly, and rather strong, too:
It loved to see the galling way
That clothes vex those whom they belong to:
'Now watch me,' cried this spell of weather,
'I'll rid him of it altogether.'

It whirled the man across the street,
It banged him up against a railing,
It twined the ulster round his feet,
But all of this was unavailing:
For not without resource it found him:
He drew the ulster closer round him.

'My word!' the man was heard to say,
'Although I like not such abuse, it's
Not strange the wind is strong to-day,
It always is in Massachusetts.
Such weather threatens much the health of
Inhabitants this Commonwealth of.'

The sun, emerging from a rift
Between the clouds, observed the victim,
And how the wind beset and biffed,
Belabored, buffeted, and kicked him.
Said he, 'This wind is doubtless new here:
'Tis quite the freshest ever blew here.'

And then he put forth all his strength,
His warmth with might and main exerted,
Till upward in its tube at length
The mercury most nimbly spurted.
Phenomenal the curious sight was,
So swift the rise in Fahrenheit was.

The man supposed himself at first
The prey of some new mode of smelting:
His pulses were about to burst,
His every limb seemed slowly melting,
And, as the heat began to numb him,
He cast the ulster wildly from him.

'Impulsive breeze, the use of force,'
Observed the sun, 'a foolish act is,
Perceiving which, you see, of course.
How highly efficacious tact is.'
The wondering wind replied, 'Good gracious!
You're right about the efficacious.'

THE MORAL deals, as morals do,
With tact, and all its virtues boasted,
But still I can't forget, can you,
That wretched man, first chilled, then roasted?
Bronchitis seized him shortly after,
And that's no cause for vulgar laughter.

A Boston man an ulster had,
An ulster with a cape that fluttered:
It smacked his face, and made him mad,
And polyglot remarks he uttered:
'I bought it at a bargain,' said he,
'I'm tired of the thing already.'

The wind that chanced to blow that day
Was easterly, and rather strong, too:
It loved to see the galling way
That clothes vex those whom they belong to:
'Now watch me,' cried this spell of weather,
'I'll rid him of it altogether.'

It whirled the man across the street,
It banged him up against a railing,
It twined the ulster round his feet,
But all of this was unavailing:
For not without resource it found him:
He drew the ulster closer round him.

'My word!' the man was heard to say,
'Although I like not such abuse, it's
Not strange the wind is strong to-day,
It always is in Massachusetts.
Such weather threatens much the health of
Inhabitants this Commonwealth of.'

The sun, emerging from a rift
Between the clouds, observed the victim,
And how the wind beset and biffed,
Belabored, buffeted, and kicked him.
Said he, 'This wind is doubtless new here:
'Tis quite the freshest ever blew here.'

And then he put forth all his strength,
His warmth with might and main exerted,
Till upward in its tube at length
The mercury most nimbly spurted.
Phenomenal the curious sight was,
So swift the rise in Fahrenheit was.

The man supposed himself at first
The prey of some new mode of smelting:
His pulses were about to burst,
His every limb seemed slowly melting,
And, as the heat began to numb him,
He cast the ulster wildly from him.

'Impulsive breeze, the use of force,'
Observed the sun, 'a foolish act is,
Perceiving which, you see, of course.
How highly efficacious tact is.'
The wondering wind replied, 'Good gracious!
You're right about the efficacious.'

THE MORAL deals, as morals do,
With tact, and all its virtues boasted,
But still I can't forget, can you,
That wretched man, first chilled, then roasted?
Bronchitis seized him shortly after,
And that's no cause for vulgar laughter.

Without the slightest basis
For hypochondriasis
A widow had forebodings
which a cloud around her flung,
And with expression cynical
For half the day a clinical
Thermometer she held
beneath her tongue.

Whene'er she read the papers
She suffered from the vapors,
At every tale of malady
or accident she'd groan;
In every new and smart disease,
From housemaid's knee to heart disease,
She recognized the symptoms
as her own!

She had a yearning chronic
To try each novel tonic,
Elixir, panacea, lotion,
opiate, and balm;
And from a homeopathist
Would change to an hydropathist,
And back again,
with stupefying calm!

She was nervous, cataleptic,
And anemic, and dyspeptic:
Though not convinced of apoplexy,
yet she had her fears.
She dwelt with force fanatical
Upon a twinge rheumatical,
And said she had a
buzzing in her ears!

Now all of this bemoaning
And this grumbling and this groaning
The mind of Jack, her son and heir,
unconscionably bored.
His heart completely hardening,
He gave his time to gardening,
For raising beans was
something he adored.

Each hour in accents morbid
This limp maternal bore bid
Her callous son affectionate
and lachrymose good-bys.
She never granted Jack a day
Without some long 'Alackaday!'
Accompanied by
rolling of the eyes.

But Jack, no panic showing,
Just watched his beanstalk growing,
And twined with tender fingers
the tendrils up the pole.
At all her words funereal
He smiled a smile ethereal,
Or sighed an absent-minded
'Bless my soul!'

That hollow-hearted creature
Would never change a feature:
No tear bedimmed his eye, however
touching was her talk.
She never fussed or flurried him,
The only thing that worried him
Was when no bean-pods
grew upon the stalk!

But then he wabbled loosely
His head, and wept profusely,
And, taking out his handkerchief
to mop away his tears,

Exclaimed: 'It hasn't got any!'
He found this blow to botany
Was sadder than were all
his mother's fears.

The Moral is that gardeners pine
Whene'er no pods adorn the vine.
Of all sad words experience gleans
The saddest are: 'It might have beans.'
(I did not make this up myself:
'Twas in a book upon my shelf.
It's witty, but I don't deny
It's rather Whittier than I!)