The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume 2 | Page 9

Jonathan Swift
she will venture profusely to throw
On
so mean a design, and a subject so low.
For mean's her design, and
her subject as mean,
The first but a rebus, the last but a dean.
A
dean's but a parson: and what is a rebus?
A thing never known to the
Muses or Phoebus.
The corruption of verse; for, when all is done,
It
is but a paraphrase made on a pun.
But a genius like hers no subject
can stifle,
It shows and discovers itself through a trifle.
By reading
this trifle, I quickly began
To find her a great wit, but the dean a
small man.
Rich ladies will furnish their garrets with stuff,
Which
others for mantuas would think fine enough:
So the wit that is
lavishly thrown away here,
Might furnish a second-rate poet a year.

Thus much for the verse, we proceed to the next,
Where the nymph

has entirely forsaken her text:
Her fine panegyrics are quite out of
season:
And what she describes to be merit, is treason:
The changes
which faction has made in the state,
Have put the dean's politics quite
out of date:
Now no one regards what he utters with freedom,
And,
should he write pamphlets, no great man would read 'em; And, should
want or desert stand in need of his aid,
This racer would prove but a
dull founder'd jade.
STELLA'S BIRTH-DAY MARCH 13, 1718-19
Stella this day is thirty-four,
(We shan't dispute a year or more:)

However, Stella, be not troubled,
Although thy size and years are
doubled
Since first I saw thee at sixteen,
The brightest virgin on the
green;
So little is thy form declined;
Made up so largely in thy mind.

O, would it please the gods to split
Thy beauty, size, and years, and
wit!
No age could furnish out a pair
Of nymphs so graceful, wise,
and fair;
With half the lustre of your eyes,
With half your wit, your
years, and size.
And then, before it grew too late,
How should I beg
of gentle fate,
(That either nymph might have her swain,)
To split
my worship too in twain.
STELLA'S BIRTH-DAY.[1] 1719-20
WRITTEN A.D. 1720-21.--Stella.
All travellers at first incline
Where'er they see the fairest sign
And
if they find the chambers neat,
And like the liquor and the meat,

Will call again, and recommend
The Angel Inn to every friend.
And
though the painting grows decay'd,
The house will never lose its trade:

Nay, though the treach'rous tapster,[2] Thomas,
Hangs a new
Angel two doors from us,
As fine as daubers' hands can make it,
In
hopes that strangers may mistake it,
We[3] think it both a shame and
sin

To quit the true old Angel Inn.
Now this is Stella's case in fact,

An angel's face a little crack'd.
(Could poets or could painters fix

How angels look at thirty-six:)
This drew us in at first to find
In

such a form an angel's mind;
And every virtue now supplies
The
fainting rays of Stella's eyes.
See, at her levee crowding swains,

Whom Stella freely entertains
With breeding, humour, wit, and sense,

And puts them to so small expense;
Their minds so plentifully fills,

And makes such reasonable bills,
So little gets for what she gives,

We really wonder how she lives!
And had her stock been less, no
doubt
She must have long ago run out.
Then, who can think we'll
quit the place,
When Doll hangs out a newer face?
Nail'd to her
window full in sight
All Christian people to invite.
Or stop and light
at Chloe's head,
With scraps and leavings to be fed?
Then, Chloe,
still go on to prate
Of thirty-six and thirty-eight;
Pursue your trade
of scandal-picking,
Your hints that Stella is no chicken;
Your
innuendoes, when you tell us,
That Stella loves to talk with fellows:

But let me warn you to believe
A truth, for which your soul should
grieve;
That should you live to see the day,
When Stella's locks
must all be gray,
When age must print a furrow'd trace
On every
feature of her face;
Though you, and all your senseless tribe,
Could
Art, or Time, or Nature bribe,
To make you look like Beauty's Queen,

And hold for ever at fifteen;
No bloom of youth can ever blind

The cracks and wrinkles of your mind:
All men of sense will pass
your door,
And crowd to Stella's at four-score.
[Footnote 1: Collated with Stella's own copy transcribed in her
volume.--Forster.]
[Footnote 2: Rascal.--Stella.]
[Footnote 3: They.--Stella.]
TO STELLA, WHO COLLECTED AND TRANSCRIBED HIS
POEMS
1720
As, when a lofty pile is raised,
We never hear the workmen praised,

Who bring the lime, or place the stones.
But all admire Inigo Jones:


So, if this pile of scatter'd rhymes
Should be approved in aftertimes;

If it both pleases and endures,
The merit and the praise are yours.

Thou, Stella, wert no longer young,
When first for thee my harp
was strung,
Without one word of Cupid's darts,
Of killing eyes, or
bleeding hearts;
With friendship and esteem possest,
I ne'er
admitted Love a guest.
In all the habitudes of life,
The friend, the
mistress, and the wife,
Variety we still pursue,
In pleasure seek for
something new;
Or else, comparing with the rest,
Take comfort that
our own is best;
The best we value by the worst,
As tradesmen
show their trash at first;
But his pursuits are at an end,
Whom Stella
chooses for a friend.
A poet starving
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