For man's support I came at first from earth, But man perverts the purpose of my birth; Beneath his plastic hand new forms I take, And either sex my services partake; The flowing lawn in stricter folds I hold, And bind in chains unseen each swelling fold; The band beneath the double chin I grace, And formal plaits that edge the Quaker's face: By me great Bess, who used her maids to cuff, Shone in the dignity of full-quilled ruff. -- Such is my whole; -- but, parted and disjoined, New wonders in my varying form you'll find. What makes the cit look big with conscious worth; What bursts from pale surprise or boisterous mirth; The sweep Rialto forms, or your fair brow -- The fault to youthful valour we allow; A word by which possession we denote, A letter high in place and first in note; What guards the beauty from the scorching ray; What little master first is taught to say; Great Nature's rival, handmaid, sometimes foe; The most pathetic counterpart of "Oh!" The whiskered pilferer and her foe demure; The lamps unbought which light the houseless poor; What bore famed heroes through the ranks of war; What's heard when falls from high the ponderous jar; What holy Paul did at Gamaliel's feet -- What Bavius writes, what schoolboys love to eat; Of eager gamesters what decides the fate; The homely rough support of Britain's state; What, joined to "been," is fatal to a toast; What guards the sailor from the shelving coast; The stage whence villains make their last harangue; What in your head and bones gives many a pang; What introduces long-tailed similes; A preposition that to place agrees; A stately animal in forests bred, A tree that lifts on high its lofty head; What best unbinds the weary student's mind; A beauteous fish in northern lakes we find; A grateful blemish on a soldier's breast: -- All these are in my single name exprest. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...TO THE MEMORY OF INEZ MILHOLLAND by GEORGIA DOUGLAS JOHNSON LINES ON CARMEN SYLVA by EMMA LAZARUS THE BOSTON ATHENAEUM by AMY LOWELL ITALIAN PICTURES: COSTA MAGIC by MINA LOY SURFACES AND MASKS; 3 by CLARENCE MAJOR |