Leavings

The next morning up early and begun our march; the way about Puckridge very bad, and my wife, in the very last dirty place of all, got a fall, but no hurt, though some dirt. At last she begun, poor wretch, to be tired, and I to be angry at it, but I was to blame; for she is a very good companion as long as she is well.
In the afternoon we got to Cambridge, where I left my wife at my cozen Angier’s while I went to Christ’s College, and there found my brother in his chamber, and talked with him; and so to the barber’s, and then to my wife again, and remounted for Impington, where my uncle received me and my wife very kindly. And by and by in comes my father, and we supped and talked and were merry, but being weary and sleepy my wife and I to bed without talking with my father anything about our business.

The way, though poor,
was a good companion.
I left my wife,
my brother, my wife,
my uncle, my wife,
my father, my wife
without a thing.


Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Wednesday 18 September 1661.

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