Wetherald, Agnes

Canada, (1857-1940)

The Whity Pink Pig

  1. Arthur was a doctor
  2. And travelled in a gig,
  3. Edgar was a learned judge
  4. And wore a gown and wig.
  5. Fred was a comedian
  6. And danced a funny jig,
  7. And Ernest was a farmer,
  8. With a whity pinky pig;
  9. A whity pinky, sharp and slinky
  10. Little blinky pig.
  11.  
  12. Edith was a mamma,
  13. With a waxen baby big,
  14. Lucy was a florist,
  15. Who planted out a twig,
  16. Nellie as a grocer sold
  17. An apple and a fig;
  18. And all would have been happy
  19. Had it not been for the pig,
  20. That pinky whity, small and mighty,
  21. Queer and flighty pig.
  22.  
  23. He gobbled up the groceries,
  24. He rooted up the twig,
  25. The doctor’s pony Rover
  26. Ran at him and broke the gig;
  27. He tangled up the learned judge
  28. Until he dropped his wig,
  29. And he stole the baby’s cookies,
  30. Did that whity pinky pig;
  31. That whity pinky, quick as winky,
  32. Swim-or-sinky pig.

Agnes Wetherald. Tree-Top Mornings. Boston: Cornhill Publishing (1921).

Prodigal Yet

  1. MUCK of the sty, reek of the trough,
  2. Blackened my brow where all might see,
  3. Yet while I was a great way off
  4. My Father ran with compassion for me.
  5.  
  6. He put on my hand a ring of gold,
  7. (There’s no escape from a ring, they say)
  8. He put on my neck a chain to hold
  9. My passionate spirit from breaking away.
  10.  
  11. He put on my feet the shoes that miss
  12. No chance to tread in the narrow path;
  13. He pressed on my lips the burning kiss
  14. That scorches deeper than fires of wrath.
  15.  
  16. He filled my body with meat and wine,
  17. He flooded my heart with love’s white light;
  18. Yet deep in the mire, with sensual swine,
  19. I long – God help me! – to wallow to-night.
  20.  
  21. Muck of the sty, reek of the trough,
  22. Blacken my soul where none may see.
  23. Father, I yet am a long way off–
  24. Come quickly, Lord! Have compassion on me!

Agnes Wetherald. Canadian Poets and Poetry edited by John William Garvin. Toronto: McClelland, Goodchild & Stewart (1916).

About the Poet:

Agnes Ethelwyn Wetherald (1857-1940), was a Canadian poet and a women’s issues columnist. She was born of English-Quaker parents at Rockwood, Ontario and educated at the Friends’ Boarding School, Union Springs, N.Y., and at Pickering College in Ontario.

As a journalist, Wetherald wrote for the London Advertiser and for a new feminist monthly, Wives and Daughters and she began to publish her poetry and essays in a wide range of Canadian and American periodicals. She also contributed essays and sketches to the Woman’s Department in The Toronto Globe under the pseudonym ‘Bel Thistlethwaite’.

Wetherald also contributed poetry and prose to the Week, including a series of articles on Canadian literary women, and collaborated with Graeme Mercer Adam on her only piece of extended fiction, An Algonquin Maiden: A Romance of the Early Days of Upper Canada (1886).

Wetherald’s poetry books include: The House of the Trees and Other Poems (1895), Tangled in Stars (1902), The Radiant Road (1904), The Last Robin (1907), Tree-Top Mornings (1921) and Lyrics and Sonnets (1931). [DES-07/14]

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