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A Ballade of Suicide

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  • A Ballade of Suicide

    The gallows in my garden, people say,
    Is new and neat and adequately tall;
    I tie the noose on in a knowing way
    As one that knots his necktie for a ball;
    But just as all the neighbours on the wall
    Are drawing a long breath to shout "Hurray!"
    The strangest whim has seized me. . . After all
    I think I will not hang myself to-day.

    To-morrow is the time I get my pay
    My uncle's sword is hanging in the hall
    I see a little cloud all pink and grey
    Perhaps the rector's mother will NOT call
    I fancy that I heard from Mr. Gall
    That mushrooms could be cooked another way
    I never read the works of Juvenal
    I think I will not hang myself to-day.

    The world will have another washing-day;
    The decadents decay; the pedants pall;
    And H.G. Wells has found that children play,
    And Bernard Shaw discovered that they squall;
    Rationalists are growing rational
    And through thick woods one finds a stream astray,
    So secret that the very sky seems small
    I think I will not hang myself to-day.

    ENVOI

    Prince, I can hear the trumpet of Germinal,
    The tumbrils toiling up the terrible way;
    Even to-day your royal head may fall
    I think I will not hang myself to-day.
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