Cross Roads

ON FIFTH AVENUE

     I walked down Fifth Avenue the other day
     (In the languid summertime everybody strolls down
        Fifth Avenue);
     And I passed women, dainty in their filmy frocks,
     And much bespatted men with canes.
     And great green busses lumbered past me,
     And impressive limousines, and brisk little 'lectrics.

     I walked down Fifth Avenue the other day,
     And the sunshine smiled at me,
     And something, deep in my heart, burst into song.
     And then, all at once, I saw her—
     A woman with painted lips and rouge-touched
        cheeks—
     Standing in front of a jeweler's window.
     She was looking at diamonds—
     A tray of great blue-white diamonds—
     And I saw a flame leap out of her eyes to meet them
     (Greedy eyes they were, and cold, like too-perfect
        jewels);
     And I realized, for the first time,
     That diamonds weren't always pretty.

     And then I SAW THE OTHER ONE:
     A thin little girl looking into a florist's shop
     At a fragrant mass of violets, dew-purple and fresh.
     She carried a huge box on her arm,
     And a man, passing, said loudly,
     "I guess somebody's hat'll be late today!"
     And the thin little girl flushed and hurried on,
     But not before I had seen the tenderness in her eyes—
     The tenderness that real women show
     When they look at vast rolling hills, or flowers, or
        very small pink babies.

     I walked down Fifth Avenue the other day.
     (All the world walks, leisurely, down Fifth Avenue
     in the summertime.)