To An Amazon
[At a recent glove-fight between FITZSIMMONS and JACK O’BRIEN,
at Philadelphia, the greater and more enthusiastic part of the
audience was composed of women.]
BEDELIA, 'neath your tiny boot
My throbbing heart I throw:
Oh, deign to smile upon my suit –
Presumptuous, I know.
My income is not large, it's true,
Of wealth I'm quite bereft:
But still – this must appeal to you –
I've such a pretty left.
I never read romantic books,
No verse can I recite;
I only know the jabs and hooks
That go to win a fight:
I cannot sing nor dance with grace,
But oh! I know the punch
That takes the victim on the place
Where he has stowed his lunch.
I've loved you ever since the night
(Which I remember still!)
When I put up that eight-round fight
With Colorado BILL.
How well I recollect, my own,
The soothing words you said,
"Leave the gazebo's wind alone,
And swat him on the head!"
I'm but a worm compared to you,
But still, I beg to state,
I've licked the world at ten stone two,
Which is my fighting weight.
And if you will but marry me,
BEDELIA, then perhaps
My second I will let you be
In all my future "scraps".
First published in Punch, August 17, 1904.
