Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, VERMONT HOUSEKEEPING, by DANIEL LEAVENS CADY


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

VERMONT HOUSEKEEPING, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: I shan't forget how much I learnt
Last Line: To book the dates for carrie nation.
Subject(s): Housekeeping; Vermont


I SHAN'T forget how much I learnt
Of prudent wives and their proceedings,
That time we got our fingers burnt
A-getting up a Course of Readings
The "Bureau" sent us through Vermont
To interest the lady leaders,
The queens, as 'twere, whose royal aid
Would boost our Massachusetts readers.

And so we laid our pipes with care
To get the proper force and suction;
We didn't call without a fair
And stylish note of introduction;
The upper-ten seemed well-disposed
To patronize our great reciters,
And several who approved our plan
Themselves were speakerettes and writers.

But here we had to take a seat;
Right here our royal progress ended;
We found that those high hands and feet
To many household cares attended;
Each queen, besides a-reigning hard,
Was sexton of her village palace,
She scoured the scepter up herself
And washed and wiped the doughnut chalice.

We set a-Tuesday as the day,
At stand the first, to hear the lions,
But soon a herald came to say
That Tuesday Lady Rushmore irons;
"Oh! I must keep my ironing day,"
She said so fast it made her stammer;
"I shan't let mildew spoil my clothes
To learn about the Tudor drama."

And so we pitched on Wednesdays next
For meeting day, but Lady Ferris
Was sorely mortified and vexed,
And she the Dame of "Sturtion Terrace!"
"I can't put off my baking day,"
She cried, "to 'tend your Wednesday sessions,
My bread is more to me than pre-
Or other Raphaelite impressions."

Then up we moved two notches more
And said we'd congregate a-Friday;
"Well, I guess not," said Queenie Gore,
"That day I make the parlor tidy;"
She took the ground beneath our feet,
She tore away the harbor jetty
By saying, "Put my sweeping off
To study D. and C. Rossetti!"

So fell our plans before the force
Of flat and stove and feather duster;
A dampness dimmed the "Reading Course,"
But all the kitchens kept their luster;
The busy queens still worked away,
The useful held the premier station;
The "Bureau" sent us off out West
To book the dates for Carrie Nation.





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