Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Fuess and Stearns, comps. The Little Book of Society Verse. 1922.

By. Owen Seaman

Coming out

JUST a week more of waiting, a week and a day,

And the night of delight will be here;

So ply me your very best pinions, I pray,

Wednesday, dear!

We’ve considered the question, and find that I must

Have arrived (beyond rational doubt)

“Unto years of discretion,” and that’s why I’m just

Coming out.

So we’re giving a dance, to establish the fact

That I’m one with the World and his Wife;

And may join, if I choose, in the popular game

Known as Life.

Yes, we’re giving a dance—on an excellent floor—

To announce that I ’ve come on the scene,

And that men for the future must say nothing more

Than they mean.

And the dress I’m to wear is a wonder of white,

Suggesting a fugitive dove;

And, I’m happy to say, it embraces me quite

Like a glove.

And the household will come and inspect my array,

While I try to look careless and bland,

Like a hair-dresser’s doll pirouetting away

On a stand.

And I fancy a bouquet in quite the best style

From a gallant anonymous swain,

Whose ingenuous blushes will render his guile

Very vain.

And I dream of the partners that jump and that jig,

And the couples that charge and chase;

And the men who convey you about like a big

Double-bass.

And the fun is to last from a fit time for bed,

All the lovely night through up to five;

Till the danc’d and the dancers are rather more dead

Than alive.

Then follows discussion, when every one goes,

Of the dresses and who wore what;

Of the men who were perfect to dance with, and those

Who were not.

And at last and alone I shall probably scan

My programme and gravely reflect

That I’ve danced with one partner more frequently than

Was correct.

And the whole to conclude about noon the next day

With a stiffness and something of pique,

To think that one cannot come out in this way

Once a week.

And the moral?—oh, bubbles will burst at a touch,

And I sha’n’t be a child any more;

Only sadder and wiser by ever so much

Than before.