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| TO-DAY I saw the shop-girl go | |
| Down gay Broadway to meet her beau. | |
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| Conspicuous, splendid, conscious, sweet, | |
| She spread abroad and took the street. | |
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| And all that niceness would forbid, | 5 |
| Superb, she smiled upon and did. | |
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| Let other girls, whose happier days | |
| Preserve the perfume of their ways, | |
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| Go modestly. The passing hour | |
| Adds splendor to their opening flower. | 10 |
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| But from this child too swift a doom | |
| Must steal her prettiness and bloom. | |
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| Toil and weariness hide the grace | |
| That pleads a moment from her face. | |
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| So blame her not if for a day | 15 |
| She flaunts her glories while she may. | |
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| She half perceives, half understands, | |
| Snatching her gifts with both her hands. | |
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| The little strut beneath the skirt | |
| That lags neglected in the dirt, | 20 |
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| The indolent swagger down the street— | |
| Who can condemn such happy feet! | |
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| Innocent! vulgar—that’s the truth! | |
| Yet with the daring wiles of youth! | |
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| The bright, self-conscious eyes that stare | 25 |
| With such hauteur, beneath such hair! | |
| Perhaps the men will find me fair! | |
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| Charming and charmed, flippant, arrayed, | |
| Fluttered and foolish, proud, displayed, | |
| Infinite pathos of parade! | 30 |
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| The bangles and the narrowed waist— | |
| The tinselled boa—forgive the taste! | |
| Oh, the starved nights she gave for that, | |
| And bartered bread to buy her hat! | |
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| She flows before the reproachful sage | 35 |
| And begs her woman’s heritage. | |
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| Dear child, with the defiant eyes, | |
| Insolent with the half surmise | |
| We do not quite admire, I know | |
| How foresight frowns on this vain show! | 40 |
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| And judgment, wearily sad, may see | |
| No grace in such frivolity. | |
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| Yet which of us was ever bold | |
| To worship Beauty, hungry and cold! | |
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| Scorn famine down, proudly expressed | 45 |
| Apostle to what things are best. | |
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| Let him who starves to buy the food | |
| For his soul’s comfort find her good, | |
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| Nor chide the frills and furbelows | |
| That are the prettiest things she knows. | 50 |
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| Poet and prophet in God’s eyes | |
| Make no more perfect sacrifice. | |
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| Who knows before what inner shrine | |
| She eats with them the bread and wine? | |
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| Poor waif! One of the sacred few | 55 |
| That madly sought the best they knew! | |
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| Dear—let me lean my cheek to-night | |
| Close, close to yours. Ah, that is right. | |
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| How warm and near! At last I see | |
| One beauty shines for thee and me. | 60 |
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| So let us love and understand— | |
| Whose hearts are hidden in God’s hand. | |
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| And we will cherish your brief Spring | |
| And all its fragile flowering. | |
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| God loves all prettiness, and on this | 65 |
| Surely his angels lay their kiss. | |
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