20
PARTISAN REJ'IEW
Women whose pretty faces had no bodies
women with ugly faces without beauty
women whose power depended on each other
said she was not a LADY, that no LADY
with any moral sense could leave cards on her;
hut she kicked up ruhied heels and thanked the Lord.
When young, because her things-in-law were Gardners,
she was invited to my grandmother's party.
Her footmen bore her on a light white satin litter
straight up the flying stair Bulfinch designed
·and set her down, thump-thump, in the hack parlor.
Thus did she lie on lilies and on roses
in a white satin cuirass she could not stand in
with parma violets at either hip hone
while men crossed and uncrossed their legs all evening,
like bees who cluster round a honey cluster;-
all this because she said she sprained her ankle.
The levee ended when her footmen entered
and my grandfather said: "Recumbent Lady,
I hope that when you come again you will he
perpendicular, not horizontal."
Winfield Townley Scott
INDIAN SUMMER- BUFFALO SUMMER
Opened like a big new colored-picture hook,
The morning took us early with the summer wind
Coming over the streets and yards from the harbor.
There was no game good enough for that morning.
