The Husband, The Wife, and the Woman In the Window

There she stands out in the cold,
Prisoner of emotions old.
As she looks through the window at the husband and wife,
Her heart blackens with hateful strife.

Her lips curl back into a spiteful hiss
Due to the rage of the beloved miss.
She then contorts her face into a cry
As she repeatedly whispers, “Why, oh why?

“I have grace, and I have poise,
Yet whenever I speak, he hears mere noise.
I was there when she broke the jar,
And yet she’s the one he let heal his scar.”

Then she hit the window with a bang
And she screamed with a bit of a twang.
Why, she wondered, did he ever go back?
So her enviously mind was filled with thoughts quite black.

“I’ve worked and I’ve waited, I’ve tried to suffice,
Yet there was always another that puts my hopes on ice.
For he’s broken my heart, but I have yet to demand
That he help me out or give me a hand.

“What do they all have that I don’t?
Why will he give them a chance, and for me won’t?”
And so the question began to gnaw,
And she reached one conclusion, “I must have a flaw!”

“A terrible flaw, something so dark
That it prevented us from having a spark!”
She turned this thought over in her head
And, in despair, she turned bright red.

“I am unloved,” she solemnly mused.
“Played the fool, left behind, and used.
I am but a fiddle, my emotions he plays,
And thus my love dwindles for countless days.

“I am but a blind dame, searching in the night
With a feeling of loneliness that I’m impotent to fight.”
Thus she felt she had no choice but to look for another.
So she took up a fancy for the husband’s brother.

For he and his brother would hunt in the wood
And--to the woman’s delight--he was just as good.
Yet there was a feeling that she would often skim,
And each time she did she would whisper, “He’s just not him.”

She looked back through the window and felt her blood boil
As her mind sped into thoughtful turmoil.
She then remembered the husband’s terrible wail
When the love of another woman came upon him like hail.

That day she thought he would want her to heal the scar,
But she was definitely wrong by far.
For soon after he entered distress
He took fancy for another mistress.

This mistress of his sucked his love up dry
By the time she wed another without a goodbye.
By then, the girl thought, the husband would want her for sure.
But, as fate would have it, her hopes would soon be no more.

For there was--to the woman’s amazement--another dame.
At this point the woman in the window had felt as if she were lame
As if her leg was deformed, or her face in a twist.
She could feel the pain of her love like a massive cist.

And so, for the brother, she tried to make up her mind
That her feelings for the other she would leave behind.
She would fall in love with the brother, and then she would be filled with joy.
Yet, for whatever reason, she couldn’t fall for her ploy.

And so each day she would say with a sigh,
“Why must my feelings for him always remain so nigh?
I’ve tried to move on, to find joy in my love each day,
And yet my love for the other simply won’t go away!”

So then she thought of the husband and his spouse
And how she felt like a minuscule louse.
The woman outside the window, in sadness, hung her head low,
And despaired in what flaws of which she did not know.

Many days later she and the husband went for a walk,
And, since they were friends, they began a friendly talk.
Yet the husband could see a troubled look on her face
And asked, “For what reason do you feel sorrow in this place?”

Thus she looked up at him, a glint of envy in her eyes,
And she thought of the wife whom she tried not to despise.
“I’ll give you a riddle,” she replied, “in the form of a rhyme.”
“Ok,” he said, “I’ll get this in no time!”

“A bird flies to a nest in search of a mate
And suddenly her eyes are filled with hate.
For, merrily chirping, is a another bird with a male
Of which the other bird whose love suddenly became stale.”

With relief she watched the husband’s expression soften.
“I see,” he said, “so am I that beastly robin?”
With a bit of regret, the girl gave a sheepish nod,
And the husband chuckled slightly, which the girl thought odd.

“My dearest friend,” the husband began, “please let your strife end.
Though we may not be lovers, we are still the dearest of friends.
I understand what you feel, and you are in no way in the wrong.
Besides, dearest friend, I’ve known all along.”

“Then why,” she asked, “did you play me like a fiddle?
Why, then, did you allow my love to achingly dwindle?”
“Because,” he explained, “that’s just life.
How do you think I felt when my last love gave herself away as a wife?”

At this the husband’s friend gave him a gentle shove,
But then, with pity, she remembered his lost love.
She had stolen his trust and then married away.
That dame had left him weeping for many a day.

So then the woman looked at the husband with a new emotion inside,
A feeling that would allow her envy to hide.
Yet, alas, her self-doubts were not far,
So she suddenly asked, “Why am I not a star?”

The husband gave her a heartwarming smile
And said, “You are a star, don’t go into denial.
For you shine bright and true in my eyes,
And I believe that there is one that has yet to realize

“Just how to express his love for this shine.”
With those words, the girl felt absolutely divine.
She learned that, even though he didn’t fall for her in the end,
The husband would always be there as a good friend.