THE APPLE WOMAN.
(From life.)
I.She often comes, a not unwelcome guest,With her old face set in a marble smile,And bonnet ribbonless—it is her best,—And little cloak—and blesses you the while,And cracks her joke, ambitious to beguileYour heart to something human,Then sets her basket down—a little rest!The Apple Woman.II.Her stock in trade that basket doth contain;It is her wholesale and her retail store,Her goods and chattels,—all that doth pertainTo her estate, a daughter of the Poor;O ye who tread upon a velvet floor,Whose walls rich lights illumine,Wound not, with word or look of high disdain,The Apple Woman.III.She is thy sister, jewelled Lady Clare,“My sister! fling this insult in my face?”How dare you then, when in the house of prayer,Utter, Our Father? difference of placeNulls not the consanguinity of race,And every creature humanIs kin to that poor mother, shivering there,The Apple Woman.IV.She sits upon the sidewalk in the cold,And with her scraggy hand, hard, shrunk and blue,And corded with the cordage of the old,She reaches forth afameuse, sir, to you,And begs her ladyship will take one, too,And if you are a true manYour pence will out; she never thinks ofgold,The Apple Woman.V.She tells me—and I know she tells me true,“My good man,—God be kind!—had long been sick,And one cold morning when the snow-storm blew,He said, dear Bess, it grieves me to the quickTo see you venture out,—give me my stick,I’ll come to you at gloamin,’And bide you home,”—she paused, the rest I knew.—Poor Apple Woman!VI.Behold her then, a type of all that’s good,Honest in poverty, in suffering kind;And large must be that love which strains for food,Through wind and rain, through frost and snows that blind,For a sick burden that is left behind;Call her but common;God’s commonest things are little understood,Poor Apple Woman!VII.Two April weeks I missed her, only two,Missed her upon the sidewalk, everywhere,And when again she chanced to cross my view,The marble smile was changed, it still was there,But darkly veined, an emblem of despair;A God-knit unionGrim death had struck, whose dark shock shivered throughThe Apple Woman.VIII.A widow now, she tells the bitter tale,Tells how she sat within their little roomIn yon dark alley, till she saw him fail,Sat all alone through night’s oppressive gloom,Sat by her Joe, as in a desert tomb,No candle to illumineHis cold dead face! God only heard her wail.—Poor Apple Woman.IX.Now, when you meet her of the basket-store,Her of the little cloak and bonnet bare,Reach forth a friendly hand, and something more,When your portmonnaie has a coin to spare.Dear are the hopes that mitigate thy care,Dear the unbought communionWhose tall vine reaches to the golden shore.—Poor Apple Woman!
I.She often comes, a not unwelcome guest,With her old face set in a marble smile,And bonnet ribbonless—it is her best,—And little cloak—and blesses you the while,And cracks her joke, ambitious to beguileYour heart to something human,Then sets her basket down—a little rest!The Apple Woman.II.Her stock in trade that basket doth contain;It is her wholesale and her retail store,Her goods and chattels,—all that doth pertainTo her estate, a daughter of the Poor;O ye who tread upon a velvet floor,Whose walls rich lights illumine,Wound not, with word or look of high disdain,The Apple Woman.III.She is thy sister, jewelled Lady Clare,“My sister! fling this insult in my face?”How dare you then, when in the house of prayer,Utter, Our Father? difference of placeNulls not the consanguinity of race,And every creature humanIs kin to that poor mother, shivering there,The Apple Woman.IV.She sits upon the sidewalk in the cold,And with her scraggy hand, hard, shrunk and blue,And corded with the cordage of the old,She reaches forth afameuse, sir, to you,And begs her ladyship will take one, too,And if you are a true manYour pence will out; she never thinks ofgold,The Apple Woman.V.She tells me—and I know she tells me true,“My good man,—God be kind!—had long been sick,And one cold morning when the snow-storm blew,He said, dear Bess, it grieves me to the quickTo see you venture out,—give me my stick,I’ll come to you at gloamin,’And bide you home,”—she paused, the rest I knew.—Poor Apple Woman!VI.Behold her then, a type of all that’s good,Honest in poverty, in suffering kind;And large must be that love which strains for food,Through wind and rain, through frost and snows that blind,For a sick burden that is left behind;Call her but common;God’s commonest things are little understood,Poor Apple Woman!VII.Two April weeks I missed her, only two,Missed her upon the sidewalk, everywhere,And when again she chanced to cross my view,The marble smile was changed, it still was there,But darkly veined, an emblem of despair;A God-knit unionGrim death had struck, whose dark shock shivered throughThe Apple Woman.VIII.A widow now, she tells the bitter tale,Tells how she sat within their little roomIn yon dark alley, till she saw him fail,Sat all alone through night’s oppressive gloom,Sat by her Joe, as in a desert tomb,No candle to illumineHis cold dead face! God only heard her wail.—Poor Apple Woman.IX.Now, when you meet her of the basket-store,Her of the little cloak and bonnet bare,Reach forth a friendly hand, and something more,When your portmonnaie has a coin to spare.Dear are the hopes that mitigate thy care,Dear the unbought communionWhose tall vine reaches to the golden shore.—Poor Apple Woman!
I.She often comes, a not unwelcome guest,With her old face set in a marble smile,And bonnet ribbonless—it is her best,—And little cloak—and blesses you the while,And cracks her joke, ambitious to beguileYour heart to something human,Then sets her basket down—a little rest!The Apple Woman.
II.Her stock in trade that basket doth contain;It is her wholesale and her retail store,Her goods and chattels,—all that doth pertainTo her estate, a daughter of the Poor;O ye who tread upon a velvet floor,Whose walls rich lights illumine,Wound not, with word or look of high disdain,The Apple Woman.
III.She is thy sister, jewelled Lady Clare,“My sister! fling this insult in my face?”How dare you then, when in the house of prayer,Utter, Our Father? difference of placeNulls not the consanguinity of race,And every creature humanIs kin to that poor mother, shivering there,The Apple Woman.
IV.She sits upon the sidewalk in the cold,And with her scraggy hand, hard, shrunk and blue,And corded with the cordage of the old,She reaches forth afameuse, sir, to you,And begs her ladyship will take one, too,And if you are a true manYour pence will out; she never thinks ofgold,The Apple Woman.
V.She tells me—and I know she tells me true,“My good man,—God be kind!—had long been sick,And one cold morning when the snow-storm blew,He said, dear Bess, it grieves me to the quickTo see you venture out,—give me my stick,I’ll come to you at gloamin,’And bide you home,”—she paused, the rest I knew.—Poor Apple Woman!
VI.Behold her then, a type of all that’s good,Honest in poverty, in suffering kind;And large must be that love which strains for food,Through wind and rain, through frost and snows that blind,For a sick burden that is left behind;Call her but common;God’s commonest things are little understood,Poor Apple Woman!
VII.Two April weeks I missed her, only two,Missed her upon the sidewalk, everywhere,And when again she chanced to cross my view,The marble smile was changed, it still was there,But darkly veined, an emblem of despair;A God-knit unionGrim death had struck, whose dark shock shivered throughThe Apple Woman.
VIII.A widow now, she tells the bitter tale,Tells how she sat within their little roomIn yon dark alley, till she saw him fail,Sat all alone through night’s oppressive gloom,Sat by her Joe, as in a desert tomb,No candle to illumineHis cold dead face! God only heard her wail.—Poor Apple Woman.
IX.Now, when you meet her of the basket-store,Her of the little cloak and bonnet bare,Reach forth a friendly hand, and something more,When your portmonnaie has a coin to spare.Dear are the hopes that mitigate thy care,Dear the unbought communionWhose tall vine reaches to the golden shore.—Poor Apple Woman!