Poem by
Edwin Arlington Robinson. Robinson bravely attempts to look into another person's
marriage and understand it. The result is a short but powerful poem.
BEN TROVATO
The deacon thought. "I know them," he began,
"And they are all you ever heard of them -
Allurable to no sure theorem,
The scorn or the humility of man.
You say 'Can I believe it? - and I can;
And I'm unwilling even to condemn
The benefaction of a strategem
Like hers - and I'm a Presbyterian.
"Though blind, with but a wandering hour to live,
He felt the other woman in the fur
That now the wife had on. Could she forgive
All that? Apparently. Her rings were gone,
Of course; and when he found that she had none,
He smiled - as he had never smiler at her."