THEIR PENS

The poet pens his odes and sonnets spruce
With quills plucked from the ordinary goose,
While critics write their sharp incisive lines
With quills snatched from the fretful porcupines.

AN UNSOLVED PROBLEM

If Bacon wrote those grand inspiring lines
At which alternately man weeps and laughs,
Who was it penned those chirographic vines
We know these times as Shakespeare’s autographs?

THE BIBLIOPHILE’S THREAT

If some one does not speedily indite
A volume that is worthy of my shelf,
I’ll have to buy materials and write
A novel and some poetry myself.

MY TREASURES

My library o’erflows with treasures rare:
Of “Dickens’ firsts,” a full, unbroken set;
And in a little nooklet off the stair
The whole edition of my novelette.

A POET’S FAD

He writes bad verse on principle,
E’en though it does not sell.
He thinks the plan original —
So many folk write well.

THE POET UNDONE

He was a poet born, but unkind Fate
Once doomed him for his verses to be paid,
Whereon he left the poet-born’s estate
And wrote like one who’d happened to be made.

A WANING MUSE

“Why art thou sad, Poeticus?” said I.
So blue was he I feared he would not speak.
“Alas! I’ve lost my grip,” was his reply —
“I’ve writ but forty poems, sir, this week.”

MODESTY

“What hundred books are best, think you?” I said,
Addressing one devoted to the pen.
He thought a moment, then he raised his head:
“I hardly know – I’ve written only ten.”

MY LORD THE BOOK

A book is an aristocrat:
’Tis pampered – lives in state;
Stands on a shelf, with naught whereat
To worry – lovely fate!

Enjoys the best of company;
And often – ay, ’tis so —
Like much in aristocracy,
Its title makes it go.

THE BIBLIOMISER

He does not read at all, yet he doth hoard
Rich books. In exile on his shelves they’re stored;
And many a volume, sweet and good and true,
Fails in the work that it was made to do.
Why, e’en the dust they’ve caught since he began
Would quite suffice to make a decent man!

THE “COLLECTOR”

I got a tome to-day, and I was glad to strike it,
Because no other man can ever get one like it.
’Tis poor, and badly print; its meaning’s Greek;
But what of that? ’Tis mine, and it’s unique.
So Bah! to others,
Men and brothers —
Bah! and likewise Pooh!
I’ve got the best of you.
Go sicken, die, and eke repine.
That book you wanted – Gad! that’s mine!

A READER

Daudet to him is e’er Dodett;
Dumas he calls Dumass;
But prithee do not you forget
He’s not at all an ass;

Because the books that he doth buy,
That on his shelf do stand,
Hold not one page his eagle eye
Hath not completely scanned.

And while this man’s orthoepy
May not be what it should,
He knows what books contain, and he
“Can quote ’em pretty good.”

FATE!

I feel that I am quite as smart
As Edward Bulwer Lytton, Bart.

I’m also every bit as bright
As Walter Scott, the Scottish knight;

And in my own peculiar way
I’m just as good as Thackeray.

But, woe is me that it should be,
They got here years ahead of me,

And all the tales I would unfold
By them already have been told.