University of Virginia Library

The Melancholy Muses

A weary lot is his who longs
For something bright in rhyme;
Men, women, children send me songs
Sepulchral or sublime.
The songs are all of bale and blight;
Alas! I do not need them,
For almost every one can write,
And nobody can read them!
Has merriment gone wholly out?
Have all the hearts been broken?
Must every mortal sing of doubt,
From Peebles to Portsoken?
Men rhyme of penalties and pains,
Forgetting joy and wassail;
The Muses dwell with stripes and chains
In Bunyan's Doubting Castle.
Ah, there have all the pleasures fled,
The Cupids all departed,
The Muses that to dance we led,
Light-footed and light-hearted!
Will ne'er a knight go blow the horn,
And knock that giant over,
Dispel the dark, let in the morn,
Give every Muse a lover?
Sad maiden Muses, vowed to pain,
Too long, perchance, they've tarried;
There never will be joy again
Till every Muse is married!