With artless Muse, and humble name, Shall I solicit public fame? Shall I, who sing the pensive strain, To soothe a mind oppressed with pain, Or in the maze of fancy stray, To pass a cheerless hour away, Boldly to meet Apollo rise, And flutter in his native skies? Presumptuous, giddy, proud, elate, Forgetting Icarus' sad fate, High on my treacherous plumage soar, And fall, like him, to rise no more? Or, to assume a strain more common, Shall I, an unknown, untaught woman, Expose myself to dread Reviews,— To paragraphs in daily news? To gall-dipp'd pens, that write one down,— To Envy's hiss, and Critic's frown? To printers, editors, and devils, With a thousand other evils, That change the high-rais'd expectation To disappointment and vexation, And chase, abash'd, from public fame, The artless Muse, the humble name? | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...NAMING FOR LOVE by HAYDEN CARRUTH ABOVE HALF MOON by JAMES GALVIN TO WILLIAM STANLEY BRAITHWAITE by GEORGIA DOUGLAS JOHNSON SPOON RIVER ANTHOLOGY: ELIZABETH CHILDERS by EDGAR LEE MASTERS SPOON RIVER ANTHOLOGY: HENRY PHIPPS by EDGAR LEE MASTERS JOHANNA PEDERSEN by KAREN SWENSON |