A poem from the poetess

'Poetess' may be a somewhat outdated word but I like it for the same reason that I like three-piece suits, women who wear their hair in chignons, and pith helmets. This is one of my favorites, by Edna St Vincent Millay.

We were very tired, we were very merry-
We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry.
It was bare and bright, and smelled like a stable-
But we looked into a fire, we leaned across a table,
We lay on a hill-top underneath the moon;
And the whistles kept blowing, and the dawn came soon.

We were very tired, we were very merry-
We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry;
And you ate an apple, and I ate a pear,
From a dozen of each we had bought somewhere;
And the sky went wan, and the wind came cold,
And the sun rose dripping, a bucketful of gold.

We were very tired, we were very merry,
We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry.
We hailed, 'Good morrow, mother!' to a shawl-covered head,
And bought a morning paper, which neither of us read;
And she wept, 'God bless you!' for the apples and the pears,
And we gave her all our money but our subway fares.

(Taken without permission from Collected Poems, c 1950)