Classic Poem

When I grow older will you be my wife?
Not now, Suzanne ... in twenty years or more.
Unless I change my mind, I'd like you for
A Bonfire in the Autumn of my Life.
But, no! You may be faded then with strife
Of living ... marry another, I implore!
And raise me up your daughter to adore,
Red Haired, with your own candent beauty rife.

My Fourteenth Wife had unresponsive hair,
As drab in tone, inert to touch, as clay;
She wore it in an ugly little knot;
She had a morbid interest in prayer,
Which vexed me so I had to have her shot. . . .
She's with the angels now! Ah, welladay!