"Nothing is new, we walk where others went
There's no vice now, but has its precedent."
--Herrick
XI xviii
Dear Cynthia, you promised me
before I came, a farm
nearby this coast, with fertile soil,
a stream, no frosts to harm
my tender vines, or lotus blooms--
you swore an easy post
would now be mine, with time to chase
what
I pursue the most.
But here my home's a shotgun shack
infested with huge rats--
this farm's minute, its ground hard clay,
my stream's gone dry, and that's
the best of it-- ice storms in March
In summer, hurricanes--
and every day I lecture on
topoi our Muse distains.
