Christina Rossetti
Vanity Fair
Some ladies dress in muslin full and white,
Some gentlemen in cloth succinct and black;
Some patronize a dog-cart, some a hack.
Some think a painted clarence only right.
Youth is not always such a pleasing sight,
Witness a man with tassels on his back ;
Or woman in a great-coat like a sack
Towering above her sex with horrid height.
If all the world were water fit to drown,
There are some whom you would not teach to
swim.
Rather enjoying if you saw them sink ;
Certain old ladies dressed in girlish pink.
With roses and geraniums on their gown : —
Go to the Bason, poke them o'er the rim.