Classic and Contemporary Poetry
TO THE REV. WILLIAM BULL, by WILLIAM COWPER Poet Analysis Poet's Biography First Line: My dear friend / if reading verse be your delight Last Line: Be always filling, never full. Subject(s): Poetry & Poets; Smoking; Tobacco; Pipes; Cigars; Cigarettes | ||||||||
June 22, 17'2. MY DEAR FRIEND, If reading verse be your delight, 'Tis mine as much, or more, to write; But what we would, so weak is man, Lies oft remote from what we can. For instance, at this very time I feel a wish, by cheerful rhyme To soothe my friend, and, had I power, To cheat him of an anxious hour; Not meaning (for I must confess, It were but folly to suppress) His pleasure, or his good alone, But squinting partly at my own. But though the sun is flaming high I' th' centre of yon arch, the sky, And he had once (and who but he?) The name for setting genius free, Yet whether poets of past days Yielded him undeserved praise, And he by no uncommon lot Was famed for virtues he had not; Or whether, which is like enough, His Highness may have taken huff, So seldom sought with invocation, Since it has been the reigning fashion To disregard his inspiration, I seem no brighter in my wits For all the radiance he emits, Than if I saw, through midnight vapour, The glimmering of a farthing taper. Oh for a succedaneum, then, To accelerate a creeping pen! Oh for a ready succedaneum, Quod caput, cerebrum, et cranium Pondere liberet exoso, Et morbo jam caliginoso! 'Tis here; this oval box well filled With best tobacco, finely milled, Beats all Anticyra's pretences To disengage the encumbered senses. Oh Nymph of Transatlantic fame, Where'er thine haunt, whate'er thy name, Whether reposing on the side Of Oroonoquo's spacious tide, Or listening with delight not small To Niagara's distant fall, 'Tis thine to cherish and to feed The pungent nose-refreshing weed, Which, whether pulverized it gain A speedy passage to the brain, Or whether, touched with fire, it rise In circling eddies to the skies, Does thought more quicken and refine Than all the breath of all the Nine-- Forgive the Bard, if Bard he be, Who once too wantonly made free, To touch with a satiric wipe That symbol of thy power, the pipe; So may no blight infest thy plains, And no unseasonable rains, And so may smiling Peace once more Visit America's sad shore; And thou, secure from all alarms Of thundering drums and glittering arms, Rove unconfined beneath the shade Thy wide-expanded leaves have made; So may thy votaries increase, And fumigation never cease. May Newton with renewed delights Perform thy odoriferous rites, While clouds of incense half divine Involve thy disappearing shrine; And so may smoke-inhaling Bull Be always filling, never full. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...ONE LAST DRAW OF THE PIPE by PAUL MULDOON CHANEL NO. 5 by LAURE-ANNE BOSSELAAR OLD MEN ON THE COURTHOUSE LAWN, MURRAY, KENTUCKY by JAMES GALVIN DOWN BY THE CARIB SEA: 2. LOS CIGARILLOS by JAMES WELDON JOHNSON A COMPARISON by WILLIAM COWPER |
|