And he might have died in bed in a year, For when they opened him up They found his heart was a played out pump, And leaked like a rusty cup. And a man can live as the church decrees, Or dance in the way of vice, A woman’s womb is a thing of doom, And life is the current price. ’Tis a vampire bat, or the leather box From which you rattle the dice. ’Tis an altar of doom, is a woman’s womb, And man is the sacrifice. THE HOUSES You wonder why I bought so many houses, Bought and repaired, built over home on house. The first one was to make a home for Mary, And Frank and Bessie, for I had myself A settled home when I was boy and man, And knew the feeling of respect, content Which comes of one familiar and continued Habitation for a boy who’s growing. The first house, then, was poor enough, God knows! A place that smelt in all the rooms of breath A sick man breathes into the very paper. The rat holes in the base boards had to be Stopped up with plaster, all the floors were loose. Bricks lay awry upon the chimney tops. An old well with a windlass on the porch Made one remember typhoid all the time. Some apple trees half-rotted, covered over With water sprouts stood in a yard of weeds. A barn was at the yard’s end out of shape From leaning at an angle. All in all The place was haunted, but it was the best I could afford just then, and naturally She hated it and grumbled all the time. A few years past, it seemed scarce two or three, And all the children married, went away. Just then I grew more prosperous and built over The haunted house, and built a handsome barn, Cut out the apple trees, destroyed the weeds, And put an iron fence around the yard. Put bathrooms, running water in the house. She jawed at me for doing this, and asked Why did you wait until the children left? Of course she knew, but blamed me just the same. And so we had no pleasure with this house. She wanted larger rooms, and trees in front, A sunny dining room--there was that porch On which ours looked, and though I closed the well She often wondered why we had not died Before I closed it.