Page:The poems of Edmund Clarence Stedman, 1908.djvu/158

POEMS OF NEW ENGLAND How she took comfort

Does not appear;

How kept her body,

On what they gave,

Out of the poor-house,

Out of the grave.

Highly connected?

Straight as the Nile

Down from "the Gard'ners"

Of Gardiner's Isle;

(Three bugles, chevron gules,

Hand upon sword),

Great-great-granddaughter

Of the third lord.

Bent almost double,

Deaf as a witch,

Gout her chief trouble—

Just as if rich;

Vain of her ancestry,

Mouth all agrin,

Nose half-way meeting her

Sky-pointed chin.

Ducking her forehead-top,

Wrinkled and bare,

With a colonial

Furbelowed air

Greeting her next of kin,

Nephew or niece,—

Foolish old, prating old

Cousin Lucrece.

Once every year she had

All she could eat:

Turkey and cranberries,

Pudding and sweet; 128