The Sick Muse
Alas—my poor Muse—what aileth thee now?
Thine eyes are bedimmed with the visions of Night,
And silent and cold—I perceive on thy brow
In their turns—Despair and Madness alight.
A succubus green, or a hobgoblin red,
Has it poured o'er thee Horror and Love from its urn?
Or the Nightmare with masterful bearing hath led
Thee to drown in the depths of some magic Minturne?
I wish, as the health-giving fragrance I cull,
That thy breast with strong thoughts could for ever be full,
And that rhymthmic'ly flowing—thy Christian blood
Could resemble the olden-time metrical-flood,
Where each in his turn reigned the father of Rhymes
Phoebus—and Pan, lord of Harvest-times.
The Venal Muse
Oh Muse of my heart—so fond of palaces old,
Wilt have—when New Year speeds its wintry blast,
Amid those tedious nights, with snow o'ercast,
A log to warm thy feet, benumbed with cold?
Wilt thou thy marbled shoulders then revive
With nightly rays that through thy shutters peep?
And—void thy purse and void thy palace—reap
A golden hoard within some azure hive?
Thou must, to earn thy daily bread, each night,
Suspend the censer like an acolyte,
Te-Deums sing, with sanctimonious ease,
Or as a famished mountebank, with jokes obscene
Essay to lull the vulgar rabble's spleen;
Thy laughter soaked in tears which no one sees.
The Evil Monk
The cloisters old, expounded on their walls
With paintings, the Beatic Verity,
The which—adorning their religious halls,
Enriched the frigidness of their Austerity.
In days when Christian seeds bloomed o'er the land,
Full many a noble monk unknown to-day,
Upon the field of tombs would take his stand,
Exalting Death in rude and simple way.
My soul is a tomb where—bad monk that I be—
I dwell and search its depths from all eternity,
And nought bedecks the walls of the odious spot.
Oh sluggard monk! when shall I glean aright
From the living spectacle of my bitter lot,
To mold my handywork and mine eyes' Delight?