THE HUMBLE PETITION OF POOR BEN TO .. KING CHARLES by BEN JONSON

Doth most humbly show it,
To your majesty your poet:
That whereas your royal father,
James the blessèd, pleased the rather,
Of his special grace to letters,
To make all the muses debtors
To his bounty; by extension
Of a free poetic pension,
A large hundred marks annuity,
To be given me in gratuity
For done service, and to come:
And that this so accepted sum,
Or dispensed in books, or bread,
(For with both the muse was fed)
Hath drawn on me, from the times,
All the envy of the rhymes,
And the rattling pit-pat noise,
Of the less-poetic boys;
When their pot-guns aim to hit,
With their pellets of small wit,
Parts of me (they judged) decayed,
But we last out, still unlaid.
Please your majesty to make
Of your grace, for goodness sake,
Those your father's marks, your pounds;
Let their spite (which now abounds)
Then go on, and do its worst;
This would all their envy burst:
And so warm the poet's tongue
You'ld read a snake, in his next song.

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!

Other Poems of Interest...