Harry Graham - Misrepresentative Women

Gentle Reader, who so patiently have waited
For such viands as your poet can provide,
(Which, as critics have occasionally stated,
Must be trying to a delicate inside,)
Once again are opportunities afforded
Of a banquet, or a déjeuner at least,
Once again your toleration is rewarded
By a literary feast!

You may think that Rudyard Kipling’s work is stronger,
Or that Chaucer’s may be rather more mature;
Byron’s lyrics are indubitably longer,
Robert Browning’s just a trifle more obscure;
But ’tis certain that no poems are politer,
Or more fitted for perusal in the home,
Than the verses of the unassuming writer
Of this memorable tome!

Austin Dobson is a daintier performer,
Andrew Lang is far more scholarly and wise,
Mr. Swinburne can, of course, be somewhat warmer,
Alfred Austin more amusing, if he tries;
But there’s no one in the world (and well you know it!)
Who can emulate the bard of whom we speak,
For the literary methods of our poet
Are admittedly unique!

Tho’ he shows no sort of penitence at breaking
Ev’ry rule of English grammar and of style,
(Not a rhyme is too atrocious for his making,
Not a metre for his purpose is too vile!)
Tho’ his treatment is essentially destructive,
And his taste a thing that no one can admire,
There is something incontestably seductive
In the music of his lyre!

Gentle Reader, some apologies are needed
For depositing this volume on your desk,
Since the author has undoubtedly exceeded
All the limits of legitimate burlesque,
And we look with very genuine affection
To a Public who, for better or for worse,
Will relieve us of this villainous collection
Of abominable verse!

I always love to picture Eve,
Whatever captious critics say,
As one who was, as I believe,
The nicest woman of her day;
Attractive to the outward view,
And such a perfect lady too!

Unselfish, – that one can’t dispute,
Recalling her intense delight,
When she acquired some novel fruit,
In giving all her friends a bite;
Her very troubles she would share
With those who happened to be there.

Her wardrobe, though extremely small,
Sufficed a somewhat simple need;
She was, if anything at all,
A trifle under dressed, indeed,
And never visited a play
In headgear known as “matinée.”

Possessing but a single beau ,
With only one affaire de cœur ,
She promptly married, as we know,
The man who first proposed to her;
Not for his title or his pelf,
But simply for his own sweet self.

He loved her madly, at first sight;
His callow heart was quite upset;
He thought her nearly, if not quite,
The sweetest soul he’d ever met;
She found him charming – for a man,
And so their young romance began.

Their wedding was a trifle tame —
A purely family affair —
No guests were asked, no pressmen came
To interview the happy pair;
No crowds of curious strangers bored them,
The “Eden Journal” quite ignored them.

They had the failings of their class,
The faults and foibles of the youthful;
She was inquisitive, alas!
And he was – not exactly truthful;
But never was there man or woman
So truly, so intensely human !

And, hand in hand, from day to day,
They lived and labored, man and wife;
Together hewed their common way
Along the rugged path of Life;
Remaining, though the seasons pass’d,
Friends, lovers, to the very last.

So, side by side, they shared, these two,
The sorrow and the joys of living;
The Man, devoted, tender, true,
The Woman, patient and forgiving;
Their common toil, their common weather,
But drew them closelier still together.

And if they ever chanced to grieve,
Enduring loss, or suff’ring pain,
You may be certain it was Eve
Brought comfort to their hearts again;
If they were happy, well I know,
It was the Woman made them so.

And though the anthropologist
May mention, in his tactless way,
That Adam’s weaknesses exist
Among our modern Men to-day,
In Women we may still perceive
The virtues of their Mother Eve!

In the old town of Coventry, so people say,
Dwelt a Peer who was utterly lacking in pity;
Universally loathed for the rigorous way
That he burdened the rates of the City.
By his merciless methods of petty taxation,
The poor were reduced to the verge of starvation.

But the Earl had a wife, whom the people adored,
For her kindness of heart even more than her beauty,
And her pitiless lord she besought and implored
To remit this extortionate “duty”;
But he answered: “My dear, pray reflect at your leisure,
What you deem a ‘duty,’ to me is a pleasure!”

At the heart of her spouse she continued to storm,
And she closed her entreaties, one day, by exclaiming: —
“If you take off the tax, I will gladly perform
Any task that you like to be naming!”
“Well, if that be the case,” said the nobleman, “I’ve a
Good mind just to test you, my Lady Godiva!

“To your wishes, my dear, I will straight acquiesce,
On the single condition – I give you fair warning —
That you ride through the City, at noon, in the dress
That you wear in your bath of a morning!”
“Very well!” she replied. “Be it so! Though you drive a
Hard bargain, my lord,” said the Lady Godiva.

So she slipped off her gown, and her shoulders lay bare,
Gleaming white like the moon on Aonian fountains;
When about them she loosened her curtain of hair,
’Twas like Night coming over the mountains!
And she blushed, ’neath the veil of her wonderful tresses,
As blushes the Morn ’neath the Sun’s first caresses!

Then she went to the stable and saddled her steed,
Who erected his ears, till he looked like a rabbit,
He was somewhat surprised, as he might be, indeed,
At the lady’s unusual “habit”;
But allowed her to mount in the masculine way,
For he couldn’t say “No,” and he wouldn’t say “Neigh!”

So she rode through the town, in the heat of the sun,
For the weather was (luckily) warm as the Tropics,
And the people all drew down their blinds – except one,
On the staff of the local “Town Topics.”
(Such misconduct produced in the eyes of this vile one
A cataract nearly as large as the Nile one!)

Then Godiva returned, and the Earl had to yield,
(And the paralyzed pressman dictated his cable;)
The tax was remitted, the bells were repealed,
And the horse was returned to the stable;
While banners were waved from each possible quarter,
Except from the flat of the stricken reporter.

Now the Moral is this – if I’ve fathomed the tale
(Though it needs a more delicate pen to explain it): —
You can get whatsoever you want, without fail,
If you’ll sacrifice all to obtain it.
You should try to avoid unconventional capers,
And be sure you don’t write for Society papers.