Flapper Fantasia

A newspaper correspondent complains that, while the modern young miss is more or less decorative in an artificial way, her fund of intelligent conversation and her vocabulary leave much to be desired.

I SAW them meet upon a crowded tram.
First, they stood beak to beak as pigeons do;
Then gushing floods of speech burst every dam:
“Dawling!” “Mai dawling! Is it REALLY you?”
Their finger-nails were painted signal-red,
Their lips bright mauve, their noses white as starch,
A scrap of straw absurdly decked each head,
Their brows were plucked down to a slender arch.

“DAWLING!” “But, DAWLING! Fency meeting HERE!
Of ALL the places in this frightful town!”
“Why, yes. It’s absolutely THRILLING, dear!”
“It’s AGES since I saw you! DO sit down!”
“What’s new? Why, DAWLING, what a gorgeous DRESS!”
“THIS rag?” “But, DEAR! It’s gorgeously DIVAIN!”
“Not REALLY, sweet?” “But definitely, YES!
It makes me feel a perfect FRUMP in main.”
“But LISTEN, dawling (whisper) Hev you heard?”
“Not GEORGE? Mai DEAR! How utterly EBSURD!”

ROUND one. They went to corners for repair;
Re-powdered noses and repainted lips,
Touched here and there their strangely plastic hair
Deftly and cunningly with finger-tips,
Gazing in mirrors raptly as they toiled;
Then sat, both strangely vague and listless eyed,
Until one more idea within them boiled,
And once again the flood-gates opened wide:

“DAWLING!” “But, sweet, it’s mejic’ly DIVAIN
Thet we should meet when AGES hev gone bai” —
“But, sweetness, Ai em LIVING on this lain —
Hev done for YEARS.” “But, PRECIOUS! So hev AI!”
“But, dawling, NO!” “But, dawling, YES, Ai say!”
“DAWLING! How weird we hev not MET before!” . . .
So they ran on, intensely, to display
Their vast vocabularies o’er and o’er.
Deep in the news I hid my burning face,
And gloatingly perused a murder case.