Page:Poems Rossetti.djvu/402

Here a rustling and a whirring,
 As of fans outspread,
Hinted that mammas felt anxious
 Lest the next thing said
Might prove less than quite judicious,
 Or even underbred.

So a mother Auk resumed
 The broken thread of speech:
"Let colours sort themselves, my dears,
 Yellow, or red, or peach;
The main points, as it seems to me.
 We mothers have to teach,

"Are form and texture, elegance,
 An air reserved, sublime;
The mode of wearing what we wear
 With due regard to month and clime.
But now, let's all compose ourselves,
 It's almost breakfast-time."

A hubbub, a squeak, a bustle!
 Who cares to chatter or sing
With delightful breakfast coming?
 Yet they whisper under the wing:
"So we may wear whatever we like,
 Anything, everything!"