I LONG have been puzzled to guess, | |
| And so I have frequently said, | |
| What the reason could really be | |
| That I never have happened to wed; | |
| But now it is perfectly clear | 5 |
| I am under a natural ban; | |
| The girls are already assigned,— | |
| And I’m a superfluous man! | |
| |
| Those clever statistical chaps | |
| Declare the numerical run | 10 |
| Of women and men in the world, | |
| Is Twenty to Twenty-and-one; | |
| And hence in the pairing, you see, | |
| Since wooing and wedding began, | |
| For every connubial score, | 15 |
| They’ve got a superfluous man! | |
| |
| By twenties and twenties they go, | |
| And giddily rush to their fate, | |
| For none of the number, of course, | |
| Can fail of a conjugal mate; | 20 |
| But while they are yielding in scores | |
| To Nature’s inflexible plan, | |
| There’s never a woman for me,— | |
| For I’m a superfluous man! | |
| |
| It is n’t that I am a churl, | 25 |
| To solitude over-inclined; | |
| It is n’t that I am at fault | |
| In morals or manners or mind; | |
| Then what is the reason, you ask, | |
| I’m still with the bachelor-clan? | 30 |
| I merely was numbered amiss,— | |
| And I’m a superfluous man! | |
| |
| It is n’t that I am in want | |
| Of personal beauty or grace, | |
| For many a man with a wife | 35 |
| Is uglier far in the face; | |
| Indeed, among elegant men | |
| I fancy myself in the van; | |
| But what is the value of that, | |
| When I’m a superfluous man? | 40 |
| |
| Although I am fond of the girls, | |
| For aught I could ever discern | |
| The tender emotion I feel | |
| Is one that they never return; | |
| ’T is idle to quarrel with fate, | 45 |
| For, struggle as hard as I can, | |
| They’re mated already, you know,— | |
| And I’m a superfluous man! | |
| |
| No wonder I grumble at times, | |
| With women so pretty and plenty, | 50 |
| To know that I never was born | |
| To figure as one of the Twenty; | |
| But yet, when the average lot | |
| With critical vision I scan, | |
| I think it may be for the best | 55 |
| That I’m a superfluous man! | |
| |
