Bliss Carman, et al., eds. The World’s Best Poetry.
Volume VII. Descriptive: Narrative. 1904. | | | | Descriptive Poems: II. Nature and Art | | Cousin Lucrece | | Edmund Clarence Stedman (1833–1908) |
| | | HERE where the curfew | |
| Still, they say, rings, | |
| Time rested long ago, | |
| Folding his wings; | |
| Here, on old Norwich’s | 5 |
| Out-along road, | |
| Cousin Lucretia | |
| Had her abode. | |
| |
| Norridge, not Nor-wich | |
| (See Mother Goose), | 10 |
| Good enough English | |
| For a song’s use. | |
| Side and roof shingled, | |
| All of a piece, | |
| Here was the cottage | 15 |
| Of Cousin Lucrece. | |
| |
| Living forlornly | |
| On nothing a year, | |
| How she took comfort | |
| Does not appear; | 20 |
| How kept her body, | |
| On what they gave, | |
| Out of the poor-house, | |
| Out of the grave. | |
| |
| Highly connected? | 25 |
| Straight as the Nile | |
| Down from “the Gard’ners” | |
| Of Gardiner’s Isle; | |
| (Three bugles, chevron gules, | |
| Hand upon sword), | 30 |
| Great-great-granddaughter | |
| Of the third lord. | |
| |
| Bent almost double, | |
| Deaf as a witch, | |
| Gout her chief trouble— | 35 |
| Just as if rich; | |
| Vain of her ancestry, | |
| Mouth all agrin, | |
| Nose half-way meeting her | |
| Sky-pointed chin. | 40 |
| |
| Ducking her forehead-top, | |
| Wrinkled and bare, | |
| With a colonial | |
| Furbelowed air | |
| Greeting her next of kin, | 45 |
| Nephew and niece,— | |
| Foolish old, prating old | |
| Cousin Lucrece. | |
| |
| Once every year she had | |
| All she could eat: | 50 |
| Turkey and cranberries, | |
| Pudding and sweet; | |
| Every Thanksgiving, | |
| Up to the great | |
| House of her kinsman, was | 55 |
| Driven in state. | |
| |
| Oh, what a sight to see | |
| Rigged in her best! | |
| Wearing the famous gown | |
| Drawn from her chest,— | 60 |
| Worn, ere King George’s reign | |
| Here chanced to cease, | |
| Once by a forbear | |
| Of Cousin Lucrece. | |
| |
| Damask brocaded, | 65 |
| Cut very low; | |
| Short sleeves and finger-mitts | |
| Fit for a show; | |
| Palsied neck shaking her | |
| Rust-yellow curls | 70 |
| Rattling its roundabout | |
| String of mock pearls. | |
| |
| Over her noddle, | |
| Draggled and stark, | |
| Two ostrich feathers— | 75 |
| Brought from the ark. | |
| Shoes of frayed satin, | |
| All heel and toe, | |
| On her poor crippled feet | |
| Hobbled below. | 80 |
| |
| My! how the Justice’s | |
| Sons and their wives | |
| Laughed; while the little folk | |
| Ran for their lives, | |
| Asking if beldames | 85 |
| Out of the past, | |
| Old fairy godmothers, | |
| Always could last? | |
| |
| No! One Thanksgiving, | |
| Bitterly cold, | 90 |
| After they took her home | |
| (Ever so old), | |
| In her great chair she sank, | |
| There to find peace; | |
| Died in her ancient dress— | 95 |
| Poor old Lucrece. | | | | |
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