The Angel in Disguise

(This is a poem adaptation of 'An Angel in Disguise' by T.S. Arthur) 

Idleness, iniquity and intemperance,

Alcohol and death bond with tenderness.

The story begins with a departed denounced mother, her children

And a life tainted with trepidations was cementing like a prison.

The old hovel was spiked by a truncate painful silence,

Murmurs sparked round accompanied by anguished grievance.

O, where is the angel in disguise?

 The next dawn was christened as the day of the entombment

Distant from the dead cart to the pauper’s grave were perplexed movements.

The mother now resided underground and the children detached,

The oldest stout John and the farmer Jones were well-matched.

Mrs. Ellis took the undisciplined Katy in with a sense of duty.

But the bed-ridden Maggie was shut out with inconsiderate apathy.

O, where is the angel in disguise?

At the threshold stood a tough man with a soft heart,

Gazing at the rejected child still in that freezing cot

All alone in strangling weakness, as the hardhearted people flee

She glanced at the wheelwright and uttered, ‘Don’t leave me…’

The aforesaid picked her immobilized self with motherly care,

Through the fields to the house he and his tempered wife share.

O, did the angel in disguise finally arrive?

Jane shrieked at the sight of their budding corded alliance,

nonetheless Maggie was put to sleep as per his convenience.

Argument spurted up between the negative wife and her obstinate husband,

But in the end, their soft and sympathetic sentiments were summoned.

Mrs Thompson went into Maggie’s chamber with sympathetic reasoning,

Whereas her husband toiled in his shop till the dusky evening.

O, did the angel in disguise finally arrive?

Joe inquired the childish kid regarding her condition,

Before heading down for the evening refection.

The table hummed with silence after boding Maggie’s fate,

The Guardians of the poorhouse were to be conferred the next date.

However, the childless women and her husband soon swelled with affection.

Maggie’s innocence, sweetness and love was the motive for the transition.

O, look at the smiling angel in disguise!