Pipit sate upright in her chair
Some distance from where I was sitting;
Views of the Oxford Colleges
Lay on the table, with the knitting.
Daguerreotypes and silhouettes,
Her grandfather and great-great-aunts,
Supported on the mantelpiece
An Invitation to the Dance.
I shall not want Honour in Heaven,
For I shall meet Sir Philip Sidney
And have talk with Coriolanus
And other heroes of his kidney.
I shall not want Capital in Heaven,
For I shall meet Sir Alfred Mond,
We two shall lie together, lapt
In a five per cent Exchequer Bond.
I shall not want Society in Heaven,
Lucrezia Borgia shall be my Bride;
Her anecdotes will be more amusing
Than Pipit's memory could provide.
I shall not want Pipit in Heaven:
Madame Blavatsky shall instruct me
In the Seven Sacred Trances;
Piccarda de' Donati will conduct me . . .
But where is the penny world I bought
To eat with Pipit behind the screen?
The red-eyed scavengers are creeping
From Kentish Town and Golder's Green.
Where are the eagles and the trumpets?
Buried beneath some snow deep Alps.
Over buttered scones and crumpets
Weeping, weeping multitudes
Droop in a hundred A.B.C.'s.
T. S. Eliot (1888 - 1965) England (born USA)
Source: Coterie No. 1 Lall, Chaman (editor), London: Hendersons, 1919-05
thank you for bringing us this
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