She never married, For she never tarried In all her life for her own pleasure; Wasted no youthful hours with love; Knew no regrets in her maturity; Gazed rigidly on futurity; And now in her tracks grown old the leisure This great square candled room speaks of To you or me Still is familiar to her as can be In terms of helpfulness to others. Religion enough were her six brothers -- Who are dead -- And, as they never wed, She was mother to each brother And wife in wife's stead. Cyrus drowsed in the Pilgrim chair; A sampler young Ezra worked hangs there; William's geraniums are growing yet (She keeps them wet); Absalom stared at the low cracked ceiling, When his brain had no more thinking in it, Till the grandfather clock ticked his last minute; The cane blind Henry used for feeling Stands where his nervous hands Put it to stay (she would not move it); and the last, Epaphroditus, she told me, was the owner (Some earlier bygone being the donor) Of that scrupulously dusted plaster cast Upon the mantelpiece, to which each night She has brought for the ghosts their candle light As long as the town has known her. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...ODE TO SPRING by ANNA LETITIA BARBAULD THE SECRET by KATHERINE MANSFIELD EVERYONE KNOWS WHOM THE SAVED ENVY by JAMES GALVIN SORROWING LOVE by KATHERINE MANSFIELD THE NEW APOCRYPHA: THE FIG TREE by EDGAR LEE MASTERS TO BE LIKED BY YOU WOULD BE A CALAMITY by MARIANNE MOORE |