A Valentine [From an old Lover]
Estelle, when you and I were rising nine
Perhaps you'd rather I suppressed the date
I spent a shilling on a valentine
And left it for you at the garden gate.
Therein my heart was imaged in a bower
Of tinsel roses, with a tender verse on;
I followed it in less than half an hour
Impatient for your gratitude in person.
You ran and kissed my cheek with candied lips,
A habit, by the way, you've since neglected;
You gambolled up and down in little skips,
Yet failed to do the thing that I expected.
It should have been a give-and-take affair;
You had my tinsel heart, while I had not one,
And when I asked for yours, to make it square,
You playfully remarked you hadn't got one. ...
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Poems by Jessie Pope
