The Note Books Of Samuel Butler

398 Poems

To Galatea grieving for her love ;

He who could show to all unseeing eyes

Glad shepherds watching o'er their flocks by night,

Or Iphis angel-wafted to the skies,

Or Jordan standing as an heap upright—

He'll meet both Jones and me and clap or hiss us
Vicariously for having writ Narcissus.

(C)
HANDEL

Father of my poor music—if such small
Offspring as mine, so born out of due time,
So scorn'd, can be called fatherful at all,
Or dare to thy high sonship's rank to climb—
Best lov'd of all the dead whom I love best,
Though I love many another dearly too,
You in my heart take rank above the rest;
King of those kings that most control me, you,
You were about my path, about my bed
In boyhood always and, where'er I be,
Whatever I think or do, you, in my head,
Ground-bass to all my thoughts, are still with me ;

Methinks the very worms will find some strain
Of yours still lingering in my wasted brain.