A Query
H. B.-D. (poet; Woman’s World)
H. B.-D.
Metadata research and editing
DVPP Project Team
Vanessa
Spacey-Dakin
Fralick
Kaitlyn
University of Victoria Digital Victorian Periodical Poetry Project
Victoria, BC, Canada
In the public domain
Woman’s World
3
263
What is the
worth in this age of gold,
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A Query
.
What is the
worth in this age of gold,
When virtue and honour are bought and sold,
When wisdom’s folly, and truth a lie,
And love a trick of a smile or sigh—
What is the price in the world’s great mart,
What is the worth of a woman’s heart ?
What can a heart do ? Answer plain.
Can a heart be ever athirst for gain ?
Can a heart be utterly selfish and hard,
Ever scheming and on its guard
To miss no chance in the world’s great race,
And win for its owner a foremost place ?
Can a heart at all times plot and plan
For self (if owned by woman or man) ?
Can it hate or love, or scorn or cringe,
And bend like a knee with a supple hinge ?
Can it fawn and flatter and lie with care ?
Then it has its price in the world’s great fair.
Alas ! a heart can but trust and love,
Be faithful and pure as the stars above ;
A woman’s heart has no thought of gain,
Only a sense of sweetness and pain,
Only a feeling that for the sake
Of its one true love it must live or break.
Then a heart has no price at all !
Faith and trust have no “ market call.”
The world rolls on and life is brief,
Men have no leisure for love or grief ;
And hearts that cannot be bought and sold
Have no market price in this age of gold.
H. B.-D.