Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, CUPID, by WILLIAM BLAKE



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CUPID, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: Why was cupid a boy
Last Line: And away fled every joy.
Variant Title(s): Why Was Cupid A Boy
Subject(s): Bible; Cupid; Mythology; Eros


WHY was Cupid a boy,
And why a boy was he?
He should have been a girl,
For aught that I can see.

For he shoots with his bow,
And the girl shoots with her eye,
And they both are merry and glad,
And laugh when we do cry.

Then to make Cupid a boy
Was surely a woman's plan,
For a boy ne'er learns so much
Till he is become a man.

And then he's so pierced with cares,
And wounded with arrowy smarts,
That the whole business of his life
Is to pick out the heads of the darts.

'Twas the Greeks' love of war
Turned love into a boy,
And woman into a statue of stone--
And away fled every joy.





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