--'Tis true! yet those must wait my leisure.
To be with thee is now my pleasure.
I love thy black and curling hair,
I love thy wounded heart's despair,
I love thy sighs, I love to swallow
Thy tears and all thy songs to follow.
Oh great indeed, might I but show it,
My love for thee, my pale-faced poet!

Away, I've heard all that before,
And am a writer, mark, no more.
Instead of verses, wares I tell,
And candy and tobacco sell.
My life is sweet, my life is bitter.
I'm ready and a prompt acquitter.
Oh, smarter traders there are many,
Yet live I well and turn a penny.

--A dealer then wilt thou remain,
Forever from the pen abstain?
Good resolutions time disperses:
Thou yet shalt hunger o'er thy verses,
But vainly seeking to excuse thee
Because thou dost, tonight, refuse me.
Then open, fool, I tell thee plain,
That we perforce shall meet again.

Begone the way that I direct thee!
I've millionaires now to protect me;