Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, MY WOOING, by EDWIN HAMILTON


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

MY WOOING, by                    
First Line: One evening, many months ago
Last Line: "she said, ""I won't!""—and isn't."
Subject(s): Courtship; Love - Age Differences; Love - Unrequited


ONE evening, many months ago,
We two conversed together;
It must have been in June or so,
For sultry was the weather.
The waving branches made the ground
With lights and shadows quiver;
We sat upon a grassy mound
That overhung a river.

We thought, as you've perhaps inferred,
Our destinies of linking:
But neither of us spoke a word,
For each of us was thinking.
Her ma had lands at Skibbereen,
Her pa estates in Devon;
And she was barely seventeen,
And I was thirty-seven.

We gathered blossoms from the bank,
And in the water flung them:
We watched them as they rose and sank
With flakes of foam among them.
As towards the falls in mimic race
They sailed—these heads of clover—
We watched them quicken in their pace,
We watched them tumble over.

We watched them; and our calm repose
Seemed calmer for their troubles;
We watched them as they sank and rose
And battled with the bubbles.
We noticed then a little bird,
Down at the margin, drinking:
But neither of us spoke a word,
For each of us was thinking.

At length I thought I fairly might
Declare my passion frantic:
(The scenery, I'm sure, was quite
Sufficiently romantic.)

I'd heard a proverb short and quaint
My memory—though shady—
Informed me it began with "faint,"
And finished up with "lady."

I summoned then the pluck to speak:
(I felt I'd have to, one day,
I only saw her once a week,
And this was only Monday.)
I called her angel, duck, and dove,
I said I loved her dearly,
My words—the whisperings of Love—
Were eloquent, or nearly.

I told her that my heart was true,
And constant as the river:
I said, "I'll love you as I do,
'For ever and for ever!'
Oh! let me hear that voice divine—"
I stopped a bit and listened;
I murmured then, "Be mine, be mine,"
She said, "I won't!"—and isn't.





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