Edmund Clarence Stedman

Cousin Lucrece

Here where the curfew
⁠     Still, they say, rings,
Time rested long ago,
⁠     Folding his wings;
Here, on old Norwich's
⁠     Out-along road,
Cousin Lucretia
⁠     Had her abode.

Norridge, not Nor-wich
     ⁠(See Mother Goose),
Good enough English
⁠     For a song's use.
Side and roof shingled,
     ⁠All of a piece,
Here was the cottage
     ⁠Of Cousin Lucrece.

Living forlornly
     ⁠On nothing a year,
How she took comfort
     ⁠Does not appear;
How kept her body,
     ⁠On what they gave,
Out of the poor-house,
⁠     Out of the grave.

Highly connected?
     ⁠Straight as the Nile
Down from "the Gard'ners"
     ⁠Of Gardiner's Isle;
(Three bugles, chevron gules,
⁠     Hand upon sword),
Great-great-granddaughter
     ⁠Of the third lord.

Bent almost double,
     ⁠Deaf as a witch,
Gout her chief trouble—
     ⁠Just as if rich;
Vain of her ancestry,
     ⁠Mouth all agrin,
Nose half-way meeting her
⁠     Sky-pointed chin.

Ducking her forehead-top,
     ⁠Wrinkled and bare,
With a colonial
     ⁠Furbelowed air
Greeting her next of kin,
     ⁠Nephew or niece,—
Foolish old, prating old
⁠     Cousin Lucrece.

Once every year she had
     ⁠All she could eat:
Turkey and cranberries,
     ⁠Pudding and sweet;
Every Thanksgiving,
⁠     Up to the great
House of her kinsman, was
⁠     Driven in state.

Oh, what a sight to see,
⁠     Rigged in her best!
Wearing the famous gown
     ⁠Drawn from her chest,—
Worn, ere King George's reign
⁠     Here chanced to cease,
Once by a forbear
     ⁠Of Cousin Lucrece.

Damask brocaded,
     ⁠Cut very low;
Short sleeves and finger-mitts
     ⁠Fit for a show;
Palsied neck shaking her
     ⁠Rust-yellow curls,
Rattling its roundabout
     ⁠String of mock pearls;

Over her noddle,
⁠     Draggled and stark,
Two ostrich feathers—
     ⁠Brought from the ark.
Shoes of frayed satin,
     ⁠All heel and toe,
On her poor crippled feet
⁠     Hobbled below.

My! how the Justice's
⁠     Sons and their wives
Laughed; while the little folk
⁠     Ran for their lives,
Asking if beldames
⁠     Out of the past,
Old fairy godmothers,
⁠     Always could last?

No! One Thanksgiving,
⁠     Bitterly cold,
After they took her home
⁠     (Ever so old),
In her great chair she sank,
⁠     There to find peace;
Died in her ancient dress—
⁠     Poor old Lucrece.