Dan Cupid’s Trick
The little boy called Love lay dead,
And on his tiny tomb
Some carven letters sweetly said
That for a day his heart had bled,
And named the maid for whom.
This maid, on coming to the mound,
Felt a remorseful pain,
And kissed his image, clasped it round,
Grew pale, and sank upon the ground,
And shed an April rain.
Then, like a prison-bursting thief,
Outleapt the bounding boy,
Whose stay in Hadés had been brief—
For hardly had he died of grief
Than he arose for joy.
“What means this caper?” cried the maid
As in his arms she sank,
And half delighted, half afraid,
Began most sweetly to upbraid
This most audacious prank.
“Fair maid, your scorn of me,” he said,
“Was all a make-believe,
And put the thought into my head
To play the trick of being dead,
To see how you would grieve.”
She dashed with anger from her eyes
Her all-too-tender tears,—
And greatly to the lad’s surprise,
And heedless of his woeful cries,
She boxed his little ears.
“Back to your tomb and there abide!
And quit it not!” quoth she
(And added, locking him inside),
“I never loved you till you died
For just your love of me.”
Theodore Tilton.