YES; I write verses now and then, <br />But blunt and flaccid is my pen, <br />No longer talk’d of by young men <br />As rather clever; <br />In the last quarter are my eyes, <br />You see it by their form and size; <br />Is it not time then to be wise? <br />Or now or never. <br /> <br />Fairest that ever sprang from Eve! <br />While Time allows the short reprieve, <br />Just look at me! would you believe <br />’T was once a lover? <br />I cannot clear the five-bar gate; <br />But, trying first its timber’s state, <br />Climb stiffly up, take breath, and wait <br />To trundle over. <br /> <br />Through gallopade I cannot swing <br />The entangling blooms of Beauty’s spring: <br />I cannot say the tender thing, <br />Be ’t true or false, <br />And am beginning to opine <br />Those girls are only half divine <br />Whose waists yon wicked boys entwine <br />In giddy waltz. <br /> <br />I fear that arm above that shoulder; <br />I wish them wiser, graver, older, <br />Sedater, and no harm if colder, <br />And panting less. <br />Ah! people were not half so wild <br />In former days, when, starchly mild, <br />Upon her high-heel’d Essex smil’d <br />The brave Queen Bess.<br /><br />Walter Savage Landor<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/time-to-be-wise/
