Fair and Softly Goes Far

F

or, The Wary Physician
A doctor, of great skill and fame,
Paulo Purganti was his name,
Had a good, comely, virtuous wife;
No woman led a better life:
She to intrigue was ev'n hard hearted:
She chuckled when a bawd was carted;
And thought the nation ne'er would thrive,
Till all the whores were burnt alive.
On married men, that dared be bad,

She thought no mercy should be had;
They should be hanged, or starved, or flayed,
Or served like Romish priests in Swede.
In short, all lewdness she defied;
And stiff was her parochial pride.
Yet, in an honest way, the dame
Was a great lover of that same;
And could from Scripture take her cue,
That husbands should give wives their due.
Her prudence did so justly steer

Between the gay and the severe,
That, if in some regards, she chose
To curb poor Paulo in too close;
In others, she relaxed again,
And governed with a looser rein.
Thus, though she strictly did confine
The doctor from excess of wine;
With oysters, eggs, and vermicelli,
She let him almost burst his belly:
Thus, drying coffee was denied;
But chocolate that want supplied;
And for tobacco—who could bear it?
Filthy concomitant of claret!—
(Blest resolution!) one might see
Eringo roots, and Bohea tea.
She often stroked the doctor's band,
And stroked his beard, and kissed his hand,
Kindly complained, that after noon
He went to pore on books too soon:
She held it wholesomer by much,
To rest a little on the couch;
About his waist in bed-a-nights
She clung on close—for fear of sprites.
The doctor understood the call,
But had not always wherewithal.
The Lion's skin too short, you know,
(As Plutarch'sMorals finely show)
Was lengthened by the Fox's tail;
And Art supplies, where Strength may fail.
Unwilling then in arms to meet
The enemy he could not beat,
He strove to lengthen the campaign,
And save his forces by chicane.
Fabius, the Roman chief, who thus
By fair retreat grew Maximus,
Shows us, that all warrior can do,
With force superior iscunctando.
One day, then, as the foe drew near,
With love, and joy, and Life, and Dear,
Our Don, who knew this tittle-tattle
Did, sure as trumpet, call to battle,
Thought it extremelyà propos,
To ward against the coming blow:
To ward: But how? ay, there's the question:
Fierce the assault, unarmed the bastion.
The doctor feigned a strange surprise;
He felt her pulse; he viewed her eyes;
That was too fast; these rolled too quick:
She was, he said, or would be sick:
He judged it absolutely good,
That she should purge, and cleanse her blood.
Spa-waters to that end were got:
If they passed easily or not,
What matters it? the lady's fever
Continued as violent as ever.
For a distemper of this kind
(Blackmore and Hans are of my mind)
If once it youthful blood infects,
And chiefly of the female sex,
Is scarce removed by pill or potion;
Whate'er may be our doctor's notion.
One luckless night then, as in bed
The doctor and the dame were laid,
Again this cruel fever came:
High pulse, short breath, and blood in flame.
What measures shall poor Paulo keep
With Madam in this piteous taking?
She, like Macbeth, has murdered sleep,
And won't allow him rest, though waking.
Sad state of matters! when we dare
Nor ask for peace, nor offer war:
Nor Livy nor Comines have shown,
What in this juncture may be done.
Grotius might own, that Paulo's case is
Harder, than any which he places
Amongst hisBelli, and hisPacis.
He strove, alas, but strove in vain,
By dint of logic to maintain
That all the sex was born to grieve,
Down to her Ladyship from Eve.
He ranged his tropes, and preached up patience;
Backed his opinion with quotations,
Divines and moralists; and run on
Quite through from Seneca to Bunyan.
As much in vain he bid her try
To fold her arms, to close her eye;
Telling her, rest would do her good,
If any thing in nature could:
So held the Greeks quite down from Galen,
Masters and princes of the calling:
So all our modern friends maintain,
(Though no great Greeks) in Warwick-lane.
Reduce, my Muse, the wand'ring song:
A tale should never be too long.
The more he talked, the more she burned,
And sighed, and tossed, and groaned, and turned:
At last, I wish, said she, my dear—
(And whispered something in his ear).
You wish! wish on, the doctor cries:
Lord! when will womankind be wise?
What! in your waters; are you mad?
Why, poison is not half so bad.
I'll do—but I give you warning;
You'll die before tomorrow morning.—
'Tis kind, my dear, what you advise,
The lady with a sign replies:
But life, you know, at best is pain:
And death is what we should disdain.
So do it therefore, and adieu:
For I will die for love of you.—
Let wanton wives by death be scared:
But, to my comfort, I'm prepared.
348
Rating:

Comment form:

*Max text - 1500. Manual moderation.

Similar Poems:

Voyages by Hart Crane
Hart Crane
I

Above the fresh ruffles of the surf
Bright striped urchins flay each other with sand.
They have contrived a conquest for shell shucks,
And their fingers crumble fragments of baked weed
Gaily digging and scattering.

And in answer to their treble interjections
The sun beats lightning on the waves,
Read Poem
0
331
Rating:

from Rubaiyat: "A Book of Verses underneath the Bough" by Omar Khayaam
Omar Khayaam
A Book of Verses underneath the Bough,
A Jug of Wine, A Loaf of Bread—and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness—
Oh, Wilderness were Paradise enow!

Read Poem
0
299
Rating:

Apollo Musagetes by Matthew Arnold
Matthew Arnold
Through the black, rushing smoke-bursts,
Thick breaks the red flame;
All Etna heaves fiercely
Her forest-clothed frame.

Not here, O Apollo!
Are haunts meet for thee.
But, where Helicon breaks down
In cliff to the sea,

Where the moon-silver'd inlets
Send far their light voice
Up the still vale of Thisbe,
O speed, and rejoice!

Read Poem
1
332
Rating:

For Tupac Amaru Shakur by Sonia Sanchez
Sonia Sanchez
who goes there? who is this young man born lonely?
who walks there? who goes toward death
whistling through the water
without his chorus? without his posse? without his song?

it is autumn now
in me autumn grieves
in this carved gold of shifting faces
my eyes confess to the fatigue of living.
Read Poem
0
561
Rating:

The Solitary Land by Adonis
Adonis
I inhabit these fugitive words,
I live, my face my face’s lone companion,
And my face is my path,

In your name, my land
That stands tall, enchanted and solitary;
In your name, death, my friend.
Read Poem
0
387
Rating:

Thyrsis: A Monody, to Commemorate the Author's Friend, Arthur Hugh Clough by Matthew Arnold
Matthew Arnold
How changed is here each spot man makes or fills!
In the two Hinkseys nothing keeps the same;
The village street its haunted mansion lacks,
And from the sign is gone Sibylla's name,
And from the roofs the twisted chimney-stacks—
Are ye too changed, ye hills?
See, 'tis no foot of unfamiliar men
To-night from Oxford up your pathway strays!
Read Poem
0
295
Rating:

One Hundred Love Sonnets: XVII by Pablo Neruda
Pablo Neruda
I don’t love you as if you were a rose of salt, topaz,
or arrow of carnations that propagate fire:
I love you as one loves certain obscure things,
secretly, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that doesn’t bloom but carries
the light of those flowers, hidden, within itself,
and thanks to your love the tight aroma that arose
from the earth lives dimly in my body.
Read Poem
0
283
Rating:

Snails by Francis Ponge
Francis Ponge
Unlike the ashes that make their home with hot coals, snails prefer moist earth. Go on: they advance while gluing themselves to it with their entire bodies. They carry it, they eat it, they shit it. They go through it, it goes through them. It’s the best kind of interpenetration, as between tones, one passive and one active. The passive bathes and nourishes the active, which overturns the other while it eats.

(There is more to be said about snails. First of all their immaculate clamminess. Their sangfroid. Their stretchiness.)

One can scarcely conceive of a snail outside its shell and unmoving. The moment it rests it sinks down deep into itself. In fact, its modesty obliges it to move as soon as it has shown its nakedness and 
revealed its vulnerable shape. The moment it’s exposed, it moves on.

During periods of dryness they withdraw into ditches where it seems their bodies are enough to maintain their dampness. No doubt their neighbors there are toads and frogs and other ectothermic animals. But when they come out again they don’t move as quickly. You have to admire their willingness to go into the ditch, given how hard it is for them to come out again.

Note also that though snails like moist soil, they have no affection for places that are too wet such as marshes or ponds. Most assuredly they prefer firm earth, as long as it’s fertile and damp.

They are fond as well of moisture-rich vegetables and green leafy plants. They know how to feed on them leaving only the veins, cutting free the most tender leaves. They are hell on salads.

What are these beings from the depths of the ditches? Though snails love many of their trenches’ qualities they have every intention of leaving. They are in their element but they are also wanderers. And when they emerge into the daylight onto firm ground their shells will preserve their vagabond’s hauteur.

It must be a pain to have to haul that trailer around with them everywhere, but they never complain and in the end they are happy about it. How valuable, after all, to be able to go home any time, no matter where you may find yourself, eluding all intruders. It must be worth it.
Read Poem
0
532
Rating:

from Don Juan: Canto 1, Stanzas 60-63 by Lord Byron (George Gordon)
Lord Byron (George Gordon)
60
Her eye (I'm very fond of handsome eyes)
Was large and dark, suppressing half its fire
Until she spoke, then through its soft disguise
Flash'd an expression more of pride than ire,
And love than either; and there would arise
A something in them which was not desire,
But would have been, perhaps, but for the soul
Which struggled through and chasten'd down the whole.

61
Her glossy hair was cluster'd o'er a brow
Bright with intelligence, and fair, and smooth;
Her eyebrow's shape was like the aerial bow,
Her cheek all purple with the beam of youth,
Read Poem
0
320
Rating:

On Love by Kahlil Gibran
Kahlil Gibran
Then said Almitra, Speak to us of Love.
And he raised his head and looked upon
the people, and there fell a stillness upon
them. And with a great voice he said:
When love beckons to you, follow him,
Though his ways are hard and steep.
And when his wings enfold you yield to
him,
Read Poem
0
1.2K
Rating:

Bound for Hell by Marina Tsvetaeva
Marina Tsvetaeva
Hell, my ardent sisters, be assured,
Is where we’re bound; we’ll drink the pitch of hell—
We, who have sung the praises of the lord
With every fiber in us, every cell.

We, who did not manage to devote
Our nights to spinning, did not bend and sway
Above a cradle—in a flimsy boat,
Wrapped in a mantle, we’re now borne away.
Read Poem
0
318
Rating:

from The Seasons: Spring by James Thomson
James Thomson
As rising from the vegetable World
My Theme ascends, with equal Wing ascend,
My panting Muse; and hark, how loud the Woods
Invite you forth in all your gayest Trim.
Lend me your Song, ye Nightingales! oh pour
The mazy-running Soul of Melody
Into my varied Verse! while I deduce,
From the first Note the hollow Cuckoo sings,
Read Poem
0
435
Rating:

Young Afrikans by Gwendolyn Brooks
Gwendolyn Brooks
of the furious


Who take Today and jerk it out of joint
have made new underpinnings and a Head.

Blacktime is time for chimeful
poemhood
but they decree a
jagged chiming now.

If there are flowers flowers
Read Poem
0
329
Rating:

A Ballad of Death by Algernon Charles Swinburne
Algernon Charles Swinburne
Kneel down, fair Love, and fill thyself with tears,
Girdle thyself with sighing for a girth
Upon the sides of mirth,
Cover thy lips and eyelids, let thine ears
Be filled with rumour of people sorrowing;
Make thee soft raiment out of woven sighs
Upon the flesh to cleave,
Set pains therein and many a grievous thing,
And many sorrows after each his wise
For armlet and for gorget and for sleeve.

O Love's lute heard about the lands of death,
Left hanged upon the trees that were therein;
O Love and Time and Sin,
Three singing mouths that mourn now underbreath,
Read Poem
0
367
Rating:

Here Now by Samuel Menashe
Samuel Menashe
Now and again
I am here now
And now is when
I’m here again
Read Poem
0
328
Rating:

Playroom by Mary Barnard
Mary Barnard
Wheel of sorrow, centerless.
Voices, sad without cause,
slope upward, expiring on grave summits.
Mournfulness of muddy playgrounds,
raw smell of rubbers and wrapped lunches
when little girls stand in a circle singing
of windows and of lovers.

Hearing them, no one could tell
Read Poem
0
258
Rating:

A Dream Within a Dream by Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe
Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow —
You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Read Poem
0
364
Rating:

Soliloquy on an Empty Purse by Mary Jones
Mary Jones
Alas, my Purse! how lean and low!
My silken Purse! what art thou now!
One I beheld—but stocks will fall—
When both thy ends had wherewithal.
When I within thy slender fence
My fortune placed, and confidence;
A poet’s fortune!—not immense:
Yet, mixed with keys, and coins among,
Read Poem
0
280
Rating:

To My Honor'd Kinsman, John Driden by John Dryden
John Dryden
Of Chesterton, In the County of Huntingdon, Esquire How blessed is he, who leads a Country Life,
Unvex’d with anxious Cares, and void of Strife!
Who studying Peace, and shunning Civil Rage,
Enjoy’d his Youth, and now enjoys his Age:
Read Poem
0
283
Rating:

The Wind Shifts by Wallace Stevens
Wallace Stevens
This is how the wind shifts:
Like the thoughts of an old human,
Who still thinks eagerly
And despairingly.
The wind shifts like this:
Like a human without illusions,
Who still feels irrational things within her.
The wind shifts like this:
Read Poem
0
369
Rating: