The Eighth Sin/Ballade of Songs Unsung
BALLADE OF SONGS UNSUNG.
I meant to write some other verseSome better, and some vastly worse.I meant to write, and never did,And now the coining Schools forbid.I'll mention what I hoped to singTo guard against all trespassing.
One on the Franco-Prussian War(It never had been done before)But now, I render thanks to Allah,It has been done by P. G - - d - ll - .
I had a very real wishTo write a trifling thing on fishIt was The Goldfish at the Tate—That one I fear will have to wait.
A Ballad of the Law Prelim.(That one was rather like a hymn.)Some musings that I had to burnFor being too like Laurence Sterne,These would have done exceeding wellAs a racy villanelle.
A sonnet To a Lady's SkullNow Used for My Tobacco AshWould have been wistful-fancifulAnd rich in Oriental pash.The Charters quaintly called SelectI hoped in metre to dissect;Also (somewhat analogous)To render the Dialogus(You know it?) de ScaccarioAnd put my tutor in a glow.The University StatutesAfford some still ungarnered fruits—In featly-footed terza-rimaThey'd please the dilettante dreamer.
Then there was something rather coarser,A fragment in the vein of Chaucer,You would have dubbed the thing robust—I'll try it yet, I really must . . .
But most of all my soul regretsMy still unwritten triolets.