" The Sad Boy

Ay, his old mother was a glad one.
And his poor old father was a mad one.
The two begot this sad one.

Alas for the single shoe
The Sad Boy pulled out of the rank green pond,
Fishing for fairies
On the prankish advice
Of two disagreeable lovers of small boys.

Pity the unfortunate Sad Boy
With a single magic shoe
And a pair of feet
And an extra foot
With no shoe for it.

This was how the terrible hopping began
That wore the Sad Boy thin and through
To his only shoe
And started the great fright in the provinces above Brent
Where the Sad Boy became half of himself
To match the beautiful boot
He had dripped from the green pond.

Wherever he went weeping and hopping
And stamping and sobbing,
Pounding a whole earth into a half-heaven,
Things split where he stood
Into the left side for the left magic,
Into no side for the missing right boot.

Mercy be to the Sad Boy
Scamping exasperated
After a wide boot
To double the magic
Of a limping foot.

Mercy to the melancholy folk
On the Sad Boy's right.
It was not for want of wandering
He lost the left boot too
And the knowledge of his left side,
But because one awful Sunday
This dear boy dislimbed
Went back to the old pond
To fish up another shoe
And was quickly (being too light for his line)
Fished in.

Gracious how he kicks now
All the little ripples up!
The quiet population of Brent has settled down,
And the perfect surface of the famous pond
Is slightly pocked, marked with three signs,
For visitors come to fish for souvenirs,
Where the Sad Boy went in
And his glad mother and his mad father after him. "

― , The Poems of Laura Riding: A Newly Revised Edition of the 1938/1980 Collection