THE BILLS

I HEAR the postman with the bills— Little bills! What a secret misery the sight of them instils! How they flutter, flutter, flutter In their envelopes of blue, While you open them and mutter, In a whisper or a stutter, “What the deuce am I to do?” Thinking where, where, where Is the money that shall square Every paltry, petty item, that monotonously fills Little bills, bills, bills, bills, Bills, bills, bills? Ah! those saddening little, maddening little bills! II Read the lengthy household bills— Awful bills! Glancing at their totals grim, the brain with horror thrills. From the East and from the West How they echo one request: “A remittance must be sent Without delay.” Food and coals and clothes and rent— It is hideous to reflect on what is meant By Quarter Day. And, enthroned amidst your cares, Impecuniosity impertinently stares. How it chills! How it kills All the future, how it fills With the haunting fear of ills, Does that pressing and distressing File of bills, bills, bills— Those offensive, comprehensive household bills! III There’s another sort of bills— Brazen bills! Each its diabolic task effectively fulfils, How all hunger to be paid In that paper cannonade! Will the trouble never end? Still they send and send and send, Day and night, In a clamorous appealing to the debtor’s scanty purse, In a wild and greedy grabbing for the starved and shrunken purse; And you curse, curse, curse, Sinking sure from bad to worse, Till a resolute endeavour Cries, “Now—now flit, or never, And renounce the unequal fight!” Oh, the bills, bills, bills— They are bitter, bitter pills To digest. Smiling ghosts of pleasures flown, Lo! we greet ye with a groan; Ye will never more return, sweet hours of rest. We shall have no more repose From the stunning And the dunning; For the monster grows and grows, Till it shatters iron wills, Under crushing And unblushing Importunity. It fills With a frantic, maniac anger in the clutches of the bills, Of the bills, Of the bills, bills, bills, Of the screeching and beseeching cloud of bills. IV Comes the threatening of bills! Cruel bills! Pictures of a ruined home inspire the writers’ quills. ’Tis the last, the sorest strait, And we shrink before the fate That is bellowed in the menace of their tone. Cringing now amongst our friends, See, the humble prayer ascends For a loan! And relations—rich relations— Will they heed our supplications? They are stone. They’ve no carking, biting, wearing, Tearing trouble of their own; No great horror of despairing Poverty they’ve ever known. Are they fathers? Are they mothers? Have they children, sisters, brothers?— Have they hearts? Back the message comes from each. God! They preach, preach, preach, Preach A sermon on our bills, Purse-proud opulency thrills With a shudder at the bills, At the bills, Saying, “Go, go, go, Pay the money that you owe. You are blotted from our wills, From our wills, wills, wills. We shall never meet your bills— Oh dear no, no, no. Ask the hills, hills, hills If they’ll help you in your woe— Beg the sea to pay your bills, Pay your bills, bills, bills.” Now the heart-beat slows and stills, Lost in wilderness of ills; Drowned in bills, bills, bills. Oh! the railing of the bills, Of the bills, bills, bills; Oh! the wailing of the bills, Of the bills, bills, bills; See them patter on his coffin, As they fill a wretch’s grave Full of bills, bills, bills— Cursèd bills!