Mismatch

I’d known them as young love’s delight

Back thirty years ago,

When Sam and Esmerelda wed

They’d put on a travelling show,

With clowns and jugglers, acrobats

And a fortune teller’s tent,

Perhaps they should have considered the date,

Not staged the show in Lent.

 

She came from money, but he was poor,

They didn’t seem to care,

‘What’s mine is yours,’ she’d always say

As she braided up her hair.

They settled down in a country house

Held parties, meets and wakes,

And lived most ostentatiously,

Just one of their many mistakes!

 

But how they loved! They’d always sigh

To many who came to stay,

‘Sam is the greatest love,’ she said

That a girl could want today!’

‘And Esmy, she is my beating heart,

We’re like two halves of the whole!’

For ever they’d wander hand in hand

In the parklands, out for a stroll.

 

They lived for the country lifestyle,

They would ride to fox and hounds,

But Sam would travel a pace behind

In the old foxhunting grounds,

He wasn’t ever as ‘Pukka’ to them,

The gentry, so it was said,

That all the old Indian Colonels

Turned away, and cut him dead!

 

But Esmerelda was more than blind

To the things that tore him up,

For she was quite the belle of the ball

When they raised the stirrup cup,

The men would always defer to her

They loved her, and adored,

While other women detested her,

And Sam was merely bored.

 

They’d travel to watch the steeplechase,

And Sam would double his bet,

He wasn’t a judge of horseflesh, nor

Had fancied a winner yet,

He took out all his frustration there

While Esmy dazzled her friends,

The more he lost, he’d triple the odds

In hopes it would make amends.

 

Now Esmerelda’s Uncle Jack

Was in charge of their receipts,

He kept his eye on her fortune, was

Beginning to scent deceit,

He managed to take his niece aside

And he whispered in her ear:

‘Did you know that your gorgeous husband’s

Gone through a hundred thousand clear?’

 

The tremor that Esmerelda felt

I’ll not go into now,

Suffice to say, it showed in her face,

It troubled her darkening brow,

The parties suddenly stopped just then,

The house was still as a tomb,

And Sam had found himself all alone

As he wandered from room to room.

 

I heard it tell there were voices raised

Went echoing over the park,

Especially when the nights were clear

There were shouts and screams in the dark,

Then a team of builders went right in

To the house, with something to do,

It seems that Esmy showed her love

By cutting the house in two!

 

Her Uncle Jack was her one support,

‘Don’t ever you think of divorce!

The courts will order him half that’s left,

As much as he lost on a horse!’

Then Sam attempted to speak to her

As the walls rose up at the back,

She said: ‘If you need to speak to me,

Just talk to my Uncle Jack!’

 

For going on twenty years they lived

Apart in that same old house,

But never a word was spoken again

By Sam to his love-lost spouse,

And then, on one long winter’s night

I saw the flames from the park,

The fire began in the side of Sam,

And spread, unseen in the dark.

 

Esmerelda was trapped upstairs

Way up on the second floor,

She saw the smoke and began to choke

As she opened the wardrobe door,

She must have known there was no escape

And perhaps, regretted the mess,

For she walked straight out on the balcony,

Was seen in her wedding dress!

 

The firemen got there far too late,

The house was barely a shell,

The flames had leapt right out of the roof,

The scene was a scene from hell,

I was standing out on my lawn by then,

Just sheltering next to my porch,

When I heard her scream, and call for Sam

As her dress went up like a torch.

 

I’d known them as young love’s delight

Back thirty years ago,

When Sam and Esmerelda wed

They’d put on a travelling show,

With clowns and jugglers, acrobats

And a fortune teller’s tent,

Perhaps they should have considered the date,

Not staged the show in Lent!

 

David Lewis Paget

Reviews

[cynthiabuhainbaello]

I posted a comment on this poem in another site but I will again comment because you are really an excellent poet. The narrative is engaging and remarkably well-crafted, with conflict and intrigue woven in it so brilliantly. As a reader, I like poems like these that have a story to tell complete with the characters' emotions laid out in vivid scenes. I hope those who comment will stick to the qualities of the poem here and not on the reviews we make. You deserve no less, David.

[Patrick]

Agreed with all below and glad I was asked to read this...something very Dickens about the whole ordeal, pip and miss havisham spring to mind. Loved the rhyme and metre scheme, not forced and gives the reader a skip to what he is reading. Sad tale when all is said and done

[Jack 2.0]

Ah, a story told the old-fashioned way. I like it, yes I like it with all assurance I must say. This tragedy reflects back 30 years, yet my mind seems to take it thirty years further. The Traveling Show was a common feature of the post-Depression era, and from this are so many stories of how tragedy begat tragedy. Yet your work here is a fresh take having a metaphor of modern divorce, then with a dash of old-world spice I think it all comes out quite well. Your eight-line prose is a nice touch too. Interesting good reading. Thanks.

[Coyote Poetry]

The story is amazing. I like the characters hope and dreams at the beginning. Their love could overcome anything. The the story went off into a sad direction. Sad how money can destroy a powerful love. I did like the ending. Thank you for sharing the outstanding story.
Coyote

[Michael X]

from longing to tragedy, the classicness applied to each stanza
draws the reader to its moment and its meaning, I always feel like I am in
another place and time when I read your brilliant work, wow

[Muse]

reading this a second time actually after stumbling upon it yesterday. I wanted to comment, but got distracted by kids. lol

I think some people get life handed over to them with a spoon and silver platter. While others have to live it...before that can earn it or understand it...call it acquired wisdom. The fortune tellers tent I do believe is a metaphor for this. We can play with our destiny's like fire..but only fate knows our fortunes. We like to think it's never about money..but unfortunately it dictates so many things in this complicated life. Thank you for sharing this amazing poem.

High scores

Muse

[olla]

nicely done.. I liked it very much..

[Lumière Dé..]

BRAVO! God, there's nothingmuch else to say that I haven't said in past comments. Thoroughly enjoyed :)

[Tate Morgan]

Well Dave that is well done.I have to say some of us cannot see it till we are married and far along.A tragic end to a sad life where money was the only solace.Reminded me of a movie where i saw the people of the future burning money to stay warm Thats all it is paper

[emmajoy]

What a wonderful tale and told in more than fine metre, David. You manage to use language that fits the stime span too, and, what's more, describe country life from a very precise vantage point - the hunting etc.. And then oh my, the social structure: poor Sam, an outsider, unused to money and.. you tell it all with just enough colour and shape to take your readers into the flow of events.
Your use of language is more than excellent, your story telling on par with Sam Dickens, Ken Simm, roarke and a few others in the Cafe who know how to spin a tale in his/her own creative style - and, added to that, you use verse. Wonderful!