The Complete Poems of Dorothy Parker

In youth, it was a way I had, To do my best to please. And change, with every passing lad To suit his theories. But now I know the things I know And do the things I do, And if you do not like me so, To hell, my love, with you.

Inventory: "Four be the things I am wiser to know: Idleness, sorrow, a friend, and a foe. Four be the things I'd been better without: Love, curiosity, freckles, and doubt. Three be the things I shall never attain: Envy, content, and sufficient champagne. Three be the things I shall have till I die: Laughter and hope and a sock in the eye.

If wild my breast and sore my pride, I bask in dreams of suicide, If cool my heart and high my head I think 'How lucky are the dead.

A Very Short Song Once, when I was young and true, Someone left me sad- Broke my brittle heart in two; And that is very bad. Love is for unlucky folk, Love is but a curse. Once there was a heart I broke; And that, I think, is worse.

Because your eyes are slant and slow, Because your hair is sweet to touch, My heart is high again; but oh, I doubt if this will get me much.

I know I have been happiest at your side; But what is done, is done, and all’s to be. And small the good, to linger dolefully- Gayly it lived, and gallantly it died. I will not make you songs of hearts denied, And you, being man, would have no tears of me, And should I offer you fidelity, You’d be, I think, a little terrified. Yet this the need of woman, this her curse: To range her little gifts, and give, and give, Because the throb of giving’s sweet to bear. To you, who never begged me vows or verse, My gift shall be my absence, while I live; But after that, my dear, I cannot swear.