Harry Graham (45)

Aus »Canned Classics«:

Harry Graham: The Postman and the Lift

»›Most of our tenants pay rents of from £350 a year upward,‹ says Mr. Goddard, of Messrs. Goddard and Smith, the well-known Piccadilly house agents, ›and would strongly resent having to ride up and down in lifts with postmen.‹« – Daily Mail.

I used to live in Jermyn Street,
   Upon the seventh floor.
I occupied a charming suite,
Bed, bath, and boudoir, all complete;
   That flat is mine no more!
For in my lute appeared a rift:
They let the postman use the lift!

Was it for this I had to pay
   Three hundred pounds a year?
I never shall forget the day
A relative arrived to stay
   (First cousin to a peer);
My word! How Aunt Eliza sniff'd!
She met a postman in the lift!

»What!« she demanded, »must I ride
   With common men like him?«
She drew her scornful skirts aside,
Her smelling-bottle she applied,
   She shook in ev'ry limb.
»Be good enough,« she said, »to sift
The lower orders from the lift!«

»Good Goddard! Fellow,« I exclaimed,
   »Is there no public stair?
Are there no regulations framed
To make a working-man ashamed
   To breathe his betters' air?
To anarchy we surely drift
When common postmen use the lift!«

In vain I claim my legal rights,
   My landlord won't give way.
He says his pity he excites
To see men scaling seven flights
   So many times a day.
To other chambers I must shift,
Where postmen never use the lift!