I married a man of the Croydon class

When I was twenty-two.

And I vex him, and he bores me

Till we don't know what to do!

It isn't good form in the Croydon class

To say you love your wife,

So I spend my days with the tradesmen's books

And pray for the end of life.

 

In green fields are blossoming trees

And a golden wealth of gorse,

And young birds sing for joy of worms:

It's perfectly clear, of course,

That it wouldn't be taste in the Croydon class

To sing over dinner or tea:

But I sometimes wish the gentleman

Would turn and talk to me

 

But every man of the Croydon class

Lives in terror of joy and speech

"Words are betrayers", "Joys are brief" 

The maxims their wise ones teach.

And for all my labour of love and life

I shall be clothed and fed,

And they'll give me an orderly funeral

When I'm still enough to be dead.

 

I married a man of the Croydon class

When I was twenty-two.

And I vex him, and he bores me

Till we don't know what to do!

And as I sit in his ordered house,

I feel I must sob or shriek,

To force a man of the Croydon class

To live, or to love, or to speak!