The Persistent Suitor
He has no right to loiter here, has no permit to tarry.
He looks no more familiar than Tom or Dick or Harry.
And yet he is persistent, as though it’s his profession.
He gives no apology and renders no confession.
One day he carries chocolates, another a bouquet,
yet they do not grant him access. They do not pave the way.
Then one day he’s missing. He doesn’t grace her door.
She hears no insistent knocking. There are no offerings more.
All day, she thinks of him and where he might have chosen to wander.
It seems perhaps that once again, absence has led to fonder
reflections on the part of one who’s playing hard-to-get.
(She is noted for her skill at it among the party set.)
One more day he’s absent. She claims she doesn’t care.
It’s easier to leave her house without a suitor there.
Yet when he finally comes again, she opens up her door
flushed with her power to attract. Victorious to the core!
“Yes?” she says, one eyebrow lifted in disdain,
as though another suitor is an aggravating pain.
And the confidence of her suitor seems never to have swerved.
As he handed her an envelope and said, “Ma’am, you’ve been served!”
The prompt today was permit.
