Near and Far (Blunden)/A Connoisseur
A Connoisseur
Presume not that gray idol with the scytheAnd hourglass of the stern perpetual sandsTo be a mere insensate mill of hours,Unawed by battles, unbeguiled with flowers;Think, this old Merlin may be vexed or blithe,And for the future stretches hungry hands.
No last year's bride discovers more capriceThan this bald magpie smuggling up his wit,And in his crumbling belfry, where the costOf high-born death in plundered ruin's lost,Nodding his glory to each glittering pieceOf glass or jewel that his fancy hit.
Close in the shop of some lean artizan,Who carves a snuff-box for Squire Harkaway,Time stoops, and Stares, and knows his destined prize:Croesus shall hunt this modest merchandizeWhen frieze and pillar of a master's planAre crushed in waggon-tracks to bind the clay.
There stalled theology makes angels weepIn twenty volumes blazoned red and gold,And there a broadside's bawled about the street;Time fetched his halfpence out and bought a sheet. The twenty volumes slumber in a heap,The ballad among heirlooms lives enrolled.
Lordly oration thronged the sculptured roof,And pamphleteered in plaudits through the town;The charlatan proclaimed his draughts and pills,And tossed the crowd his woodcuts and his bills;From rhetoric's remains Time flies aloof,And hears the quack still pattering to the clown.
Voluptuous canvas! Venus in May-bloom,Sunshine of vital gold, faun-twinkling groves,Harmonious limbs and volant veils, go mourn;For you will lie with fire, while Time has borneThe blue-daubed frigate from the servants' roomTo swell the mad collection of his loves.