"When Flora sweeps the Table with a Vole, / What Breast so steel'd as Grief can not invade, / To see the Havock on her Beautys made!"

— Cooke, Thomas (1703-1756)


Place of Publication
London
Publisher
Printed, and sold, by J. Purser [etc.]
Date
1753
Metaphor
"When Flora sweeps the Table with a Vole, / What Breast so steel'd as Grief can not invade, / To see the Havock on her Beautys made!"
Metaphor in Context
Some Poets say, if such we Poets call,
That Women have no Characters at all:[1]
Whatever others think, I'm sure such Creatures
Can not be Men, or must be Women-haters.
No Characters at all! What's Lady Grace,
Who's never absent, with her formal Face,
Soon as the Doors are open, from her Pew,
Yet the next Hour to Assignation true?
Must Lady Pride too pass unheeded by,
Who views her Husband with a scornful Eye,
Because he's humbly born, but with Lord Fool
She'll condescend at Night to -- play a Pool?
What can such Poets think of Mrs. Prude,
Who says the fanning Zephyrs are too rude,
But, when Sir Bluster haul'd her from the Light,
Was too good-natur'd to reprove the Knight?
One Character has fill'd the comic Scene,
Enough to give to gentle Minds the Spleen:
When youthful Cloe, lovelyer than the Rose,
Sweet and as chaste as when untouch'd it blows,
Neglectful of her Charms and fairer Name,
Sees the Sun rising on a losing Game,
What Heart so hard as not to mourn her Fate,
And with her Fame retriev'd before too late!
To see what Anguish shakes her tender Soul,
When Flora sweeps the Table with a Vole,
What Breast so steel'd as Grief can not invade,
To see the Havock on her Beautys made!
But these are Faults which distant Climes may own,
To British Maids and British Wives unknown:
No imputation on their Fame can fall,
Where all are Trumans, Indianas all.
Categories
Provenance
Searching "breast" and "steel" in HDIS (Poetry)
Date of Entry
06/13/2005

The Mind is a Metaphor is authored by Brad Pasanek, Assistant Professor of English, University of Virginia.