The Abused Gallant

Two lovely maidens (woe is me!)
Play tennis with my heart;
And each is wondrous fair to see,
And each is wondrous smart.

In learning, money, beauty, birth,
None can surpass them—none.
But each receives my “court” with mirth,
And tells the other one.

My “court”! The term is fitly used—
A tennis court, you see.
And I know well I am abused,
By the “racket” they give me.

Maud strikes my heart a brutal blow,
And Mabel cries out, “Fault!”
And back and forth I undergo
A feminine assault.

Maud asks my age. Alas! I hear
Sweet Mabel say, “The goose
Is very nearly forty, dear.”
Maud answers, “Oh, ‘the deuce’!”

And so my poor heart with their wit
Is volleyed oft and oft,
Till Mabel cries, while holding it,
“This heart is far too soft.”

And firing it into the net,
She says, with girlish vim,
“Although he isn’t in our ‘set,’
We’re making ‘game’ of him.”

And making game they are, I swear
By all the saints above,
With all the terms of tennis there
Save but the sweetest, “love.”