| |
| WHAT can I write in thee, O dainty book, | |
| About whose daintiness faint perfume lingers— | |
| Into whose pages dainty ladies look, | |
| And turn thy dainty leaves with daintier fingers? | |
| |
| Fitter my ruder muse for ruder song, | 5 |
| My scrawling quill to coarser paper matches; | |
| My voice, in laughter raised too loud and long, | |
| Is hoarse and cracked with singing tavern catches. | |
| |
| No melodies have I for ladies’ ear, | |
| No roundelays for jocund lads and lasses— | 10 |
| But only brawlings born of bitter beer, | |
| And chorussed with the clink and clash of glasses! | |
| |
| So, tell thy mistress, pretty friend, for me, | |
| I cannot do her hest, for all her frowning, | |
| While dust and ink are but polluting thee, | 15 |
| And vile tobacco-smoke thy leaves embrowning. | |
| |
| Thou breathest purity and humble worth— | |
| The simple jest, the light laugh following after. | |
| I will not jar upon thy modest mirth | |
| With harsher jest, or with less gentle laughter. | 20 |
| |
| So, some poor tavern-haunter, steeped in wine, | |
| With staggering footsteps thro’ the streets returning, | |
| Seeing, through gathering glooms, a sweet light shine | |
| From household lamp in happy window burning, | |
| |
| May pause an instant in the wind and rain | 25 |
| To gaze on that sweet scene of love and duty, | |
| But turns into the wild wet night again, | |
| Lest his sad presence mar its holy beauty. | |
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