The Relict:
Alas, I remember! For it seemed so long ago
since that indelible day of Michaelmas
that unremittingly changed my life forever.
It is, in retrospect, the sole imprint of my deceased husbands' existence left in my servile heart
the latter of which bemoans the bereavement of him evermore.
Whence has the heart such impotence to dispel affliction?
The day in speaking took place at my confectionary in Highbury
when the former was in its' aurora.
I was wrapping up a parcel
for one of my most recurrent customers
when a swarthy, gallant man trudged in.
And such a man he was!
His uniform attested that he was of the English militia
and ostensibly, his peremptory aura
impelled the habitually convivial customers into reticence.
All was over in a minute.
I had fulfilled my destiny.
I was a captive and a slave.
Of whom should you enquire?
Of the stately itinerant that acquired the amenities
and the deference of everyone in the room
My infatuation proliferated every second he was in my presence,
and I resolved to be better acquainted with this Mr. Edward Bates.
Little did I know that within two years we would be united in conjugal affinity.
Also little did I know how swift our time would be together.
For tuberculosis transcended his once blissful life
and left his widow to pine to the grave.
Henceforth, all the affability, all the potency
that god had instilled in me had fallen away
as quickly as the leaves fall from trees in the first chill wind of autumn.
How inconceivable it is now as I behold my dilapidated shop
that it was once so opulent and replete,
constantly pervaded with gregarious customers!
Now the only proof that such a place had ever been,
was the debilitated, penitent woman that meanders the house day and night,
me.