STREPHON: HOW favoured are we, Phyllis, That ours is not the age When rustic Amaryllis Enjoyed a rustic rage; Her freckles and her frolics, Her stupid swains we know— I've read their old bucolics (I had to years ago!). PHYLLIS: @3I@1 haven't (thanks to heaven, And Fraülein's easy yoke); But still I fancy, Strephon, I know your tiresome folk: Their compliments—becowslipped, Their idylls—of the sheep, Their wreaths—that o'er the brows slipped In unbecoming sleep! STREPHON: I picture you reclining With cricked and aching spine, To catch the pan-pipes whining Beneath some draughty pine; You, Phyllis, with your brooches And Paris frocks to-day Supreme among the coaches, Resplendent at the play! PHYLLIS: I simply can't imagine You on the classic lawns, With no Enclosure badge on, Amid the festive fauns: Or lounging, say, astride of A log on summer nights, You, Strephon, you the pride of The window-seat at White's! STREPHON: They knew not bands and cities, Nor streets in bunting bound; @3Their@1 bunting chirped his ditties When Pan came barging round; For in their futile, far land, The only crownings were When someone dumped a garland On someone else's hair! PHYLLIS: Yet sometimes, when the dawning Comes o'er the chimneys tall, I find I'm almost yawning Half through some ripping ball; It's odd, but all one knows is Just then that such things please As hedges and wild-roses And buttercups and bees! STREPHON: Why not then? @3I'll@1 have fancies; I, too, would botanize And pick—I think they're pansies— The blue things like your eyes: Or down the Henley reaches The crank canoe impel, To lunch 'neath Shiplake beeches— If you were there as well! PHYLLIS: This much then for conclusion, I'd say small difference is 'Twixt tommy-rot effusion And old absurdities— The sort your shepherd-sillies Fired off in fatuous flow For rustic Amaryllis, A million years ago! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...SPOON RIVER ANTHOLOGY: COONEY POTTER by EDGAR LEE MASTERS THE PRETTY GIRL OF LOCH DAN by SAMUEL FERGUSON RECESSIONAL by RUDYARD KIPLING TO LUCASTA, [ON] GOING TO THE WARS by RICHARD LOVELACE JOURNEY by EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY AT THE SHRINE by RICHARD KENDALL MUNKITTRICK ON THE SOUL by PUBLIUS AELIUS HADRIANUS MOLLY PITCHER [JUNE 28, 1778] by LAURA ELIZABETH HOWE RICHARDS |