Clendenin's Lament

While bridal knots are being tied
And bridal meats are being basted,
I shiver in the cold outside
And pine for joys I've never tasted.

Oh, what's a nomination worth,
When you have labored months to get it
If, all at once, with heartless mirth,
The cruel senator's upset it?

Fate weaves me such a toilsome way,
My modest wisdom may not ken it--
But, all the same, a plague I say
Upon that stingy, hostile senate!