Marriage Market. A Ballad on Love and Money

We all have read those famous books
That talk of someone’s striking looks
And fortunes over years amassed
And to the noblest heirs passed.
The ways the heirs’ lives then unroll
The Marriage Market does control:
The institution which prevails
In life and all the famous tales.
The wish to marry never fades:
Its presence all our lives pervades
While we but lead the lonely quest
And hope to find what suits us best.
Some do, although it seems that those
Exist exclusively in prose
Too sentimentally inclined
And verses of a plainer kind.
Most don’t: they grieve and start to mourn
The opportunities forgone
When they begin to realize
The choice they made was quite unwise.
The Market’s laws are cut in stone:
The poor one has to die alone
Unless he finds the love herself
Which may ignore his lack of wealth.
The rich one always does attract,
No matter how he’ll choose to act,
The notice of the public eye
Until he’ll marry or he’ll die.

My hero is a man of means
Whose fame a lot of favors wins.
He is a lord but does not mind
Good people of a lower kind.
His name is Mr. Darcy, which
Young ladies happens to bewitch:
The most expected one of all
He must attend this evening’s ball.
The ball is nothing but a chance
The chance of wedding to enhance,
And all the ladies do but sweat
When Mr. Darcy’s silhouette
At last appears in the doors.
The mothers’ mood picks us and soars:
They gather in a circle tight
And Mr. Darcy’s movements sight.
Within a blink he is approached
By two old women trained and coached
To be the sweetest of the lot
And counterbalance any plot.
Their task divine’s to introduce
Young ladies able to induce
Affection in a single Lord
And then in rumors find reward.
They now escort a would-be queen
Who thinks she needs to intervene
In Mr. Darcy’s solitude,
And his seclusion to conclude.

They start to talk, but something’s wrong:
It takes the lady much too long
To Mr. Darcy’s words respond:
She is indeed of him too fond
And misses all the jokes and jests.
The music finally suggests
The conversation to postpone
And step inside the dancing zone.
They do, but when the music ends
The lord observes his good old friends
All smoking by the fireplace
With youthful dignity and grace.
He begs the lady’s pardon and
Politely shakes her glovèd hand
Before retreating to the side
Where rings of smoke the air do ride.
And yet before he settles down
Among the masters of the town
He meets James Rockefeller, whom
Some find another splendid groom.

“Good evening, James.” “The lord himself!
How are your noble mood and health?”
“I can’t complain. And how are yours?”
“I’m fine, let any doubt disperse!
I saw you dance with Lady Jane…
How was it? Will you now complain?
Or did you take the baited hook?”
His friend assumed a graver look:
“She is indeed a pretty girl,
Her teeth remind of fairest pearl,
Her eyes are bright, her dress is red,
But overall… she’s underfed!”
“They kept her thin so she would please
Your eyes with elegance and ease.
You’ve always been too harsh a judge!”
Said Rockefeller with a nudge.
“Perhaps I’m harsh, but I don’t take
The ostentatious and the fake.
All I demand’s a simple must:
I need a wife whom I can trust.”
“Why don’t you trust this lady frail?
She has no hoofs, nor horns, nor tail,
To questions wittily replies
And looks so deeply in one’s eyes…
Sometimes she even speaks in verse!”
“That trick is easy to rehearse.
Nevertheless, it’s not the art
That truly matters to her heart:
The thought of wealth her reason haunts
And money’s all this lady wants.
I bet, whatever is at stake,
She knows how much per day I make!”

Thus spoke the bachelor and lord
And truth imbued his every word…
But what is truth? A simple fact
That leaves the state of things intact.
Meanwhile the lights begin to fade
And hordes of guests the hallway raid.
The ball is over, time to leave…
The poor young ladies deeply grieve,
In parting bows their bodies bend
And wonder how they can amend.
Their mothers’ eyes are filled with pain:
Another evening’s passed in vain!
The cause of sadness bids “Goodnight”
And is remarkably polite,
To all the young and older fruits
Of all the present clans and roots.
Then with perceptible relief
He tells his coachman something brief
And steps inside a carriage rich
Where all his thoughts at once do switch.
No, Mr. Darcy wasn’t struck:
In fact, he did not give a fuck
For all the nervousness and buzz
Around. He simply never does.
His is not wife composed of lies
Whose bloom away too quickly flies:
It is a lady of respect
Whom Mr. Darcy does expect.