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  • An old maid early eer I knew



     * * *


    An old maid early eer I knew

    Ought but the love that on me grew

    And now Im coverd oer & oer

    And wish that I had been a Whore


    O I cannot cannot find

    The undaunted courage of a Virgin Mind

    For Early I in love was crost

    Before my flower of...

  • Old Pardon, the Son of Reprieve

    You never heard tell of the story?

    Well, now, I can hardly believe!

    Never heard of the honour and glory

    Of Pardon, the son of Reprieve?

    But maybe you're only a Johnnie[1]

    And don't know a horse from a hoe?

    Well, well, don't get angry...

  • The Old Violon

  • On a Columnar Self —

    On a Columnar Self —

    How ample to rely

    In Tumult — or Extremity —

    How good the Certainty


    That Lever cannot pry —

    And Wedge cannot divide

    Conviction — That Granitic Base —

    Though None be on our Side —


    Suffice Us — for a Crowd —

    Ourself — and Rectitude —...

  • On a Goldfinch Starved to Death in his Cage

    TIME was when I was free as air,

    The thistle's downy seed my fare,

       My drink the morning dew;

    I perch'd at will on ev'ry spray,

    My form genteel, my plumage gay,

       My strains for ever new.


    But gaudy plumage, sprightly strain,

    And form genteel, were all in vain,

       And of a...

  • On a great coxcomb

    (recovering from an Indisposition)


    Narcissus (as Ovid informs us) expir'd,

    Consum'd by the flames his own beauty had fir'd;

    But N---o (who like him is charm'd with his face,

    And sighs for his other fair-self in the glass)

    Loves to greater excess than Narcissus---for why?

    He loves himself too much...

  • On A Lady, Coquetting With A Very Silly Fellow.

       CORINNA'S judgment do not less admire,

    That she for Oulus shows a gen'rous fire;
    Lucretia toying thus had been a fool,

    But wiser Helen might have us'd the tool.

    Since Oulus for one use alone is fit,

    With charity judge of Corinna's wit.

  • On a Picture (Botta 01)

            When Summer o'er her native hills

                A veil of beauty spread,

            She sat and watched her gentle fold,

                And twined her flaxen thread.

     

            The mountain daisies kissed her feet,

                The moss sprung greenest there;

            The breath of Summer fanned...

  • On a Picture (Botta 02)

            Why bends she o'er that glittering toy

                With such an earnest gaze,

            As if those flashing jewels cast

                Love glances in their rays?

     

            By that high, thought-enthronéd brow—

                That deep and soul-lit eye,

            I know 'tis not the passing...

  • On a picture of Harvey Birch




            I know not if thy noble worth

               My country's annals claim,

            For in her brief, bright history

               I have not read thy name.


            I know not if thou e'er didst live;

               Save in the vivid thought

            Of him who chronicled thy life,...