Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, A PARISIAN FAUXBOURG, by GEORGE CROLY


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

A PARISIAN FAUXBOURG, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: Tis light and air again: an lo! The seine
Last Line: Drip from the attic o'er the fuming street.
Subject(s): Paris, France


'Tis light and air again: and lo! the Seine,
Yon boasted, lazy, livid, fetid drain!
With paper booths, and painted trees o'erlaid,
Baths, blankets, wash-tubs, women, all but trade.
Yet here are living beings, and the soil
Breeds its old growth of ribaldry and broil.
A whirl of mire, the dingy cabriolet
Makes the quick transit through the crowded way;
On spurs the courier, creaks the crazy wain,
Dragg'd through its central gulf of mud and stain;
Around our way-laid wheels the paupers crowd,
Naked, contagious, cringing, and yet proud.
The whole a mass of folly, filth, and strife,
Of heated, rank, corrupting, reptile life;
And, endless as their oozy tide, the throng
Roll on with endless clamour, curse, and song.
Fit for such tenants, lour on either side
The hovels where the gang less live than hide;
Story on story, savage stone on stone,
Time-shatter'd, tempest-stain'd, not built, but thrown.
Sole empress of the portal, in full blow,
The rouged grisette lays out her trade below,
Even in her rags a thing of wit and wile,
Eye, hand, lip, tongue, all point, and press, and smile.
Close by, in patch and print, the pedlar's stall
Flutters its looser glories up the wall.
Spot of corruption! where the rabble rude
Loiter round tinsel tomes, and figures nude;
Voltaire, and Lais, long alternate eyed,
Till both the leper's soul and sous divide.
Above, 'tis desert, save where sight is scared
With the wild visage through the casement barr'd;
Or, swinging from their pole, chemise and sheet
Drip from the attic o'er the fuming street.





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