Dorothy Parker (1893–1967) wrote essays, poems, reviews—nearly anything that paid. But she was most of all a wit, a “wisecracker” (in her own estimation) of the kind that America seemed to produce as public figures only during her generation: literary, popular, caustic, punning, and often cruel. In “Now at Liberty,” she puts the common tropes of old lovelorn poetry: the pale lover departed, the heart broken, the world gone tragic. And in eight-line tetrameter stanzas, she plays against those hackneyed (and now socially dated) tropes her parenthetical observations that nevertheless a girl wants to have fun.

Now at Liberty
by Dorothy Parker

Little white love, your way you’ve taken;
    Now I am left alone, alone.
Little white love, my heart’s forsaken.
    (Whom shall I get by telephone?)
Well do I know there’s no returning;
    Once you go out, it’s done, it’s done.
All of my days are gray with yearning.
    (Nevertheless, a girl needs fun.)

Little white love, perplexed and weary,
    Sadly your banner fluttered down.
Sullen the days, and dreary, dreary.
    (Which of the boys is still in town?)
Radiant and sure, you came a-flying;
    Puzzled, you left on lagging feet.
Slow in my breast, my heart is dying.
    (Nevertheless, a girl must eat.)

Little white love, I hailed you gladly;
    Now I must wave you out of sight.
Ah, but you used me badly, badly.
    (Who’d like to take me out tonight?)
All of the blundering words I’ve spoken,
    Little white love, forgive, forgive.
Once you went out, my heart fell, broken.
    (Nevertheless, a girl must live.)

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With “Poem of the Day,” The New York Sun offers a daily portion of verse selected by the Sun’s poetry editor, Joseph Bottum of Dakota State University, with the help of the North Carolina poet Sally Thomas, The Sun’s associate poetry editor. Tied to the day, or the season, or just individual taste, the poems will be typically drawn from the lesser-known portion of the history of English verse. In the coming months we will be reaching out to contemporary poets for examples of current, primarily formalist work, to show that poetry can still serve as a delight to the ear, an instruction to the mind, and a tonic for the soul.