 | The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes |  |
LETTER TO THE GOVERNOR
WILLIAM W. SWAIN
Tell me, Dear Governor, what shall I do for you,How can you ask me to write something new for you—
I, who am working myself to an atomy
Over my lectures in odious Anatomy?
Surely your breast cannot hold such a stony part
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That you refuse to accept an apology—
Guilt I confess, but I plead Osteology.
What if I came; Why the pavement would fly at me.
Bucks would start up and insist on a shy at me.
Science suspending her habeas corpusses
While I was shooting or looking at porpusses
—But there's a secret, Alas! that I'm splitting with;
Guns do not suit me there's danger of killing with.
Deer are such dears that I gladly would kiss 'em all,
Treat 'em like ladies—and thats why I Miss 'em all;
Fishing is getting too rough for my feeling heart
Though catching eels is a branch of the 'ealing art;
Then as to feasting, it doesn't agree with me
Each single goblet is equal to three with me
Wine is my foe, though I still am a friend of it—
Hock becomes hic with a cup at the end of it—
And if I sit where the bumpers are bubbling,
While I am looking each Cork seems a D(o)ublin!
—Fairest of Islands the birds ever light about
Thine are the beauties for angels to write about;
Kindest of hearts that a button e'er burst over
Thine are the virtues that saints would cry first over!
Blessings fall on you both, thick as the snow does,
Till your last doe shall be do, with the dodos!
| The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes | |