Ode--'On A Distant Prospect' Of Making A Fortune
Now the 'rosy morn appearing'
Floods with light the dazzled heaven;
And the schoolboy groans on hearing
That eternal clock strike seven:-
Now the waggoner is driving
Towards the fields his clattering wain;
Now the bluebottle, reviving,
Buzzes down his native pane.
But to me the morn is hateful:
Wearily I stretch my legs,
Dress, and settle to my plateful
Of (perhaps inferior) eggs.
Yesterday Miss Crump, by message,
Mentioned 'rent,' which 'p'raps I'd pay;'
And I have a dismal presage
That she'll call, herself, to-day.
Once, I breakfasted off rosewood,
Smoked through silver-mounted pipes -
Then how my patrician nose would
Turn up at the thought of 'swipes!'
Ale,--occasionally claret, -
Graced my luncheon then:- and now
I drink porter in a garret,
To be paid for heaven knows how.
When the evening shades are deepened,
And I doff my hat and gloves,
No sweet bird is there to 'cheep and
Twitter twenty million loves:'
No dark-ringleted canaries
Sing to me of 'hungry foam;'
No imaginary 'Marys'
Call fictitious 'cattle home.'
Araminta, sweetest, fairest!
Solace once of every ill!
How I wonder if thou bearest
Mivins in remembrance still!
If that Friday night is banished
Yet from that retentive mind,
When the others somehow vanished,
And we two were left behind:-
When in accents low, yet thrilling,
I did all my love declare;
Mentioned that I'd not a shilling -
Hinted that we need not care:
And complacently you listened
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poem by Charles Stuart Calverley
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