Women must weep By Prof. F. Harald Williams [i.e. F. W. O. Ward]. First Edition |
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THE UNPARDONABLE SIN. |
 | Women must weep |  |
107
THE UNPARDONABLE SIN.
What has she done, why is she driven
Away from home of fairer plan,
While run her comrades as she ran,
To prizes for which she has striven?
What bitter ban,
Her little span
Of happy life has rudely riven,
Which should to its sweet close have thriven,
As flowers that summer breezes fan,
And not be thus a thing unshriven?
What is the one sin not forgiven,
By man?
Away from home of fairer plan,
While run her comrades as she ran,
To prizes for which she has striven?
What bitter ban,
Her little span
Of happy life has rudely riven,
Which should to its sweet close have thriven,
As flowers that summer breezes fan,
And not be thus a thing unshriven?
What is the one sin not forgiven,
By man?
Say, has she dared to break the fetter,
Which slowly fits us for the sod,
And scorned the tyrant Fashion's rod,
And social rules that only fret her—
To tamely plod,
At pedants' nod,
Who nothing know but lying letter,
When she has found the spirit better?
Yet sisters sin, in velvet shod,
Though her soft eyes are wild and wetter;
Or is she sacrilegious debtor,
To God?
Which slowly fits us for the sod,
And scorned the tyrant Fashion's rod,
And social rules that only fret her—
To tamely plod,
At pedants' nod,
Who nothing know but lying letter,
When she has found the spirit better?
Yet sisters sin, in velvet shod,
Though her soft eyes are wild and wetter;
Or is she sacrilegious debtor,
To God?
Come, did she take a higher station,
And not to place and honour crawl
By crooked byeways mean and small,
As those who rule a cheated nation,
They mistress call,
But render thrall?
Did she refuse the dirty ration
From plundered power, and that ovation
Which smooths the smiling traitor's fall?
Or, by her hate for simulation,
Win a bright crown of condemnation
From all?
And not to place and honour crawl
By crooked byeways mean and small,
As those who rule a cheated nation,
They mistress call,
But render thrall?
Did she refuse the dirty ration
From plundered power, and that ovation
Which smooths the smiling traitor's fall?
Or, by her hate for simulation,
Win a bright crown of condemnation
From all?
108
Nay, she has erred, and Fate is spinning
Her winding sheet of many a clout,
Of grisly fear and ghastly doubt,
Which do not mask the jester's grinning,
The battle shout,
And pity's pout;
Her friends will reap her goodly winning,
And only bear a casual thinning,
Not of the conscience but of gout;
For she, who had the best beginning,
Has been, while others veil their sinning,
Found out.
Her winding sheet of many a clout,
Of grisly fear and ghastly doubt,
Which do not mask the jester's grinning,
The battle shout,
And pity's pout;
Her friends will reap her goodly winning,
And only bear a casual thinning,
Not of the conscience but of gout;
For she, who had the best beginning,
Has been, while others veil their sinning,
Found out.
| Women must weep | |