If Amy Lowell Had Been James Whitcomb Riley
A Decade
When you came you were like red wine and honey,
And the taste of you burnt my mouth with its sweetness.
Now you are like morning bread—
Smooth and pleasant,
I hardly taste you at all, for I know your savour,
But I am completely nourished.
—Amy Lowell, in The Chimæra.
When I wuz courtin’ Annie, she wuz honey an’ red wine,
She made me feel all jumpy, did that ol’ sweetheart o’ mine;
Wunst w’en I went to Crawfordsville, on one o’ them there trips,
I kissed her—an’ the burnin’ taste wuz sizzlin’ on my lips.
An’ now I’ve married Annie, an’ I see her all the time,
I do not feel the daily need o’ bustin’ into rhyme.
An’ now the wine-y taste is gone, fer Annie’s always there,
An’ I take her fer granted now, the same ez sun an’ air.
But though the honey taste wuz sweet, an’ though the wine wuz strong,
Yet ef I lost the sun an’ air, I couldn’t git along.