A Slice Of Wedding Cake

Why have such scores of lovely, gifted girls

    Married impossible men?

  Simple self-sacrifice may be ruled out,

    And missionary endeavour, nine times out of ten.

  Repeat 'impossible men':  not merely rustic,

    Foul-tempered or depraved

  (Dramatic foils chosen to show the world

    How well women behave, and always have behaved).

  Impossible men:  idle, illiterate,

    Self-pitying, dirty, sly,

  For whose appearance even in City parks

    Excuses must be made to casual passers-by.

  Has God's supply of tolerable husbands

    Fallen, in fact, so low?

  Or do I always over-value woman

    At the expense of man?

                        Do I?

                                It might be so.