WILL WATERPROOF'S LYRICAL MONOLOGUE. 183 To make me write my random rhymes, Ere they be half-forgotten; Nor add and alter, many times, Till all be ripe and rotten. I pledge her, and she comes and dips And lays it thrice upon my lips, Until the charm have power to make And barren commonplaces break To full and kindly blossom. I pledge her silent at the board : And touch upon the master-chord Of all I felt and feel. Old wishes, ghosts of broken plans, And phantom hopes assemble; And that child's heart, within the man's Thro' many an hour of summer suns, By many pleasant ways, Like Hezekiah's, backward runs The shadow of my days : I kiss the lips I once have kiss'd; The gas-light wavers dimmer ; And softly, thro' a vinous mist, I grow in worth, and wit, and sense, Unboding critic-pen, Or that eternal want of pence, Which vexes public men, Who hold their hands to all, and cry For that which all deny them Who sweep the crossings, wet or dry, And all the world go by them. Ah yet, though all the world forsake, Though fortune clip my wings, I will not cramp my heart, nor take Half-views of men and things. Let Whig and Tory stir their blood; But for some true result of good All parties work together. Let there be thistles, there are grapes ; Ten thousand broken lights and shapes, Let raffs be rife in prose and rhyme, We lack not rhymes and reasons, As on this whirligig of Time We circle with the seasons. This earth is rich in man and maid; With fair horizons bound: This whole wide earth, of light and shade, Comes out, a perfect round. High over roaring Temple-bar, And, set in Heaven's third story, I look at all things as they are, But thro' a kind of glory Head-waiter, honour'd by the guest Half-mused, or reeling-ripe, The pint, you brought me, was the best But though the port surpasses praise, Is there some magic in the place? For since I came to live and learn, Had ever half the power to turn This wheel within my head, Which bears a season'd brain about, Unsubject to confusion, Though soak'd and saturate, out and out, Thro' every convolution. For I am of a numerous house, With many kinsmen gay, Where long and largely we carouse As who shall say me nay: Each month, a birth-day coming on, Or sometimes two would meet in one, Whether the vintage, yet unkept, Or, elbow-deep in sawdust, slept, As old as Waterloo ; Or stow'd (when classic Canning died) In musty bins and chambers, Had cast upon its crusty side The gloom of ten Decembers. The Muse, the jolly Muse, it is! She answer'd to my call, She changes with that mood or this, Is all-in-all to all: She lit the spark within my throat, Her life into the liquor. |