Tag Archives: Claude

To a Fat Lady Seen from the Train

The Train in the Country. Claude Monet. 1871.

 

To a Fat Lady Seen from the Train

Frances Cornwell

 

O why do you walk through the fields in gloves,

Missing so much and so much?

O fat white woman whom nobody loves,

Why do you walk through the fields in gloves,

When the grass is soft as the breast of doves

And hsivering sweet to the touch?

O why do you walk through the fields in gloves,

Missing so much and so much?

 

Frances Cornwell was the daughter of Charles Darwin. I am posting her heavy-handed poem only for the fun of sharing G. K. Chesterton’s devastating rejoinder.

 

The Fat White Woman Speaks

G. K. Chesterton

 

Why do you rush through the field in trains,

Guessing so much and so much?

Why do you flash through the flowery meads,

Fat-headed poet that nobody reads;

And why do you know such a frightful lot

About people in gloves as such?

And how the devil can you be sure,

Guessing so much and so much,

How do you know but what someone who loves

Always to see me in nice white gloves

At the end of the field you are rushing by,

Is waiting for his Old Dutch?

 

Had you noticed Cornwell’s snobbish hypocrisy?