The poem
I have old women's secrets now That had those of the young; Madge tells me what I dared not think When my blood was strong, And what had drowned a lover once Sounds like an old song.
Though Margery is stricken dumb If thrown in Madge's way, We three make up a solitude; For none alive to-day Can know the stories that we know Or say the things we say:
How such a man pleased women most Of all that are gone, How such a pair loved many years And such a pair but one, Stories of the bed of straw Or the bed of down.