| YOU say you love me, and you lay | |
| Your hand and fortune at my feet: | |
| I thank you, sir, with all my heart, | |
| For love is sweet. | |
| |
| It is but little to you men, | 5 |
| To whom the doors of Life stand wide; | |
| But much, how much to woman! She | |
| Has naught beside. | |
| |
| You make the worlds wherein you move, | |
| You rule your tastes, or coarse, or fine; | 10 |
| Dine, hunt, or fish, or waste your gold | |
| At dice and wine. | |
| |
| Our world (alas, you make that, too!) | |
| Is narrower, shut in four blank walls: | |
| Know you, or care, what light is there? | 15 |
| What shadow falls? | |
| |
| We read the last new novel out, | |
| And live in dream-land till it ends: | |
| We write romantic school-girl notes, | |
| That bore our friends. | 20 |
| |
| We learn to trill Italian songs, | |
| And thrum for hours the tortured keys: | |
| We think it pleases you, and we | |
| But live to please. | |
| |
| We feed our birds, we tend our flowers, | 25 |
| (Poor in-door things of sickly bloom,) | |
| Or play the housewife in our gloves, | |
| And dust the room. | |
| |
| But some of us have hearts and minds, | |
| So much the worse for us and you; | 30 |
| For grant we seek a better life, | |
| What can we do? | |
| |
| We cannot build and sail your ships, | |
| Or drive your engines; we are weak, | |
| And ignorant of the tricks of Trade. | 35 |
| To think, and speak, | |
| |
| Or write some earnest, stammering words | |
| Alone is ours, and that you hate; | |
| So forced within ourselves again | |
| We sigh and wait. | 40 |
| |
| Ah, who can tell the bitter hours, | |
| The dreary days, that women spend? | |
| Their thoughts unshared, their lives unknown, | |
| Without a friend! | |
| |
| Without a friend? And what is he, | 45 |
| Who, like a shadow, day and night, | |
| Follows the woman he prefers— | |
| Lives in her sight? | |
| |
| Her lover, he: a gallant man, | |
| Devoted to her every whim; | 50 |
| He vows to die for her, so she | |
| Must live for him! | |
| |
| We should be very grateful, sir, | |
| That, when you 've nothing else to do, | |
| You waste your idle hours on us— | 55 |
| So kind of you! | |
| |
| Profuse in studied compliments, | |
| Your manners like your clothes are fine, | |
| Though both at times are somewhat strong | |
| Of smoke and wine. | 60 |
| |
| What can we hope to know of you? | |
| Or you of us? We act our parts: | |
| We love in jest: it is the play | |
| Of hands, not hearts! | |
| |
| You grant my bitter words are true | 65 |
| Of others, not of you and me; | |
| Your love is steady as a star: | |
| But we shall see. | |
| |
| You say you love me: have you thought | |
| How much those little words contain? | 70 |
| Alas, a world of happiness, | |
| And worlds of pain! | |
| |
| You know, or should, your nature now, | |
| Its needs and passions. Can I be | |
| What you desire me? Do you find | 75 |
| Your all in me? | |
| |
| You do. But have you thought that I | |
| May have my ways and fancies, too? | |
| You love me well; but have you thought | |
| If I love you? | 80 |
| |
| But think again. You know me not: | |
| I, too, may be a butterfly, | |
| A costly parlor doll on show | |
| For you to buy. | |
| |
| You trust me wholly? One word more. | 85 |
| You see me young: they call me fair: | |
| I think I have a pleasant face, | |
| And pretty hair. | |
| |
| But by and by my face will fade, | |
| It must with time, it may with care: | 90 |
| What say you to a wrinkled wife, | |
| With thin, gray hair? | |
| |
| You care not, you: in youth, or age, | |
| Your heart is mine, while life endures. | |
| Is it so? Then, Arthur, here 's my hand, | 95 |
| My heart is yours. | |
