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Thomas Stearns Eliot (1888-1965)

Aunt Helen


              1Miss Helen Slingsby was my maiden aunt,
              2And lived in a small house near a fashionable square
              3Cared for by servants to the number of four.
              4Now when she died there was silence in heaven
              5And silence at her end of the street.
              6The shutters were drawn and the undertaker wiped his feet --
              7He was aware that this sort of thing had occurred before.
              8The dogs were handsomely provided for,
              9But shortly afterwards the parrot died too.
            10The Dresden clock continued ticking on the mantelpiece,
            11And the footman sat upon the dining-table
            12Holding the second housemaid on his knees --
            13Who had always been so careful while her mistress lived.

Notes

10] Dresden clock: a town in Saxony that manufactures clocks with white porcelain ornaments or figurines.

Online text copyright © 2009, Ian Lancashire (the Department of English) and the University of Toronto.
© T.S. Eliot and Faber and Faber Ltd 1974
Published by the Web Development Group, Information Technology Services, University of Toronto Libraries.

Original text: T. S. Eliot, Prufrock and Other Observations (London: The Egoist, 1917): 33. E546 P784 1917 Fisher Rare Book Library. Donald Gallup, T. S. Eliot: A Bibliography (London: Faber and Faber, 1969): A1.
First publication date: October 1915
Publication date note: Published in Poetry (October 1915)
RPO poem editor: Ian Lancashire
RP edition: RPO 1998.
Recent editing: 2:2002/2/28

Rhyme: irregular

Other poems by Thomas Stearns Eliot

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