Jerked Heartstrings in Town
I have heard echoes and seen visions of you
Often of late. Once yawning at a play
A sad keen rapture suddenly pierced me through
Because one puppet moved and sighed your way;
An omnibus’conductor fixed your glance
— Intense, preoccupied — upon my fare ;
I saw your stooping shoulders, at a dance,
Lean by a doorway: but you were not there.
Down Oxford Street, in the slow shopping crowd,
Hearing your very voice, ” Ah, that’s superb ”
I turned, — a tawdry simpering little dowd
Passed by, and left me trembling on the kerb.
from Songs for sale, an anthology of recent poetry, edited by Emily Beatrix Coursolles (E. B. C.) Jones
Oxford: B. H. Blackwell; New York, Longmans, Green & Co., 1918
Available on the Internet Archive: Link.
This is one in a series of neglected poems from the Internet Archive.