'Tis bitter, yet 'tis sweet, <br />Scratching effects but transient ease; <br />Pleasure and pain together meet, <br />And vanish as they please. <br /> <br />My nails, the only balm, <br />To ev'ry bump are oft applied, <br />And thus the rage will sweetly calm <br />Which aggravates my hide. <br /> <br />It soon returns again; <br />A frown succeeds to ev'ry smile; <br />Grinning I scratch and curse the pain, <br />But grieve to be so vile. <br /> <br />In fine, I know not which <br />Can play the most deceitful game, <br />The devil, sulphur, or the itch; <br />The three are but the same. <br /> <br />The devil sows the itch, <br />And sulphur has a loathsome smell, <br />And with my clothes as black as pitch, <br />I stink where'er I dwell. <br /> <br />Excoriated deep, <br />By friction play'd on ev'ry part, <br />It oft deprives me of my sleep, <br />And plagues me to my heart.<br /><br />George Moses Horton<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/troubled-with-the-itch-and-rubbing-sulfur/
