ROMANCER, far more coy than that coy sex! <br />Perchance some stroke of magic thee befell, <br />Ere thy baronial keep the Muse did vex, <br />Nor grant deliverance from enchanted spell, <br />But tease thee all the while and sore perplex, <br />Till thou that wizard tale shouldst fairly tell, <br />Better than poets in thy own clear prose. <br />Painter of sin in its deep scarlet dyes, <br />Thy doomsday pencil Justice doth expose, <br />Hearing and judging at the dread assize; <br />New England’s guilt blazoning before all eyes, <br />No other chronicler than thee she chose. <br />Magician deathless! dost thou vigil keep, <br />Whilst ’neath our pines thou feignest deathlike sleep?<br /><br />Amos Bronson Alcott<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/hawthorne/
