Patience.

The girl with the side long gaze…c. 1470.. Petrus Christus

Patience.

Across the table she does patiently sit,

While I pour forth with my urbane wit,

Not a flinch of eye nor lift of brow,

Gives away what she’s doubting now,

That my weakness lay not in my verbs,

But rather in my prolix words.

So there she sits and there she knows,

More solid in sound than an auctioneer’s close,

Her sympathy smile like his gavel blows,

Her words as gentle as a nurse’s touch,

Never a hint that I am too garrulous,

In the playful world of cunning men,

She reveals so little,

Because she knows so much!