An Autograph

What is the trifle which you would demand '?
The self-betraying of a tremulous hand.
That ne'er in useful labour was employ
Though once with self-production overjoy
Its strutting capitals and whisking tails.
Quaint cyphers, slanting to the veering gales
Of vanity and would-be wit, implied
That e'en my digits felt a Poet's pride.
That pride of rhyme, that pert, pen-jerking joy,
Has left me long. I am no more a boy ;
For yesternoon, alas ! brought home to me
The solemn tidings I was forty-three.
At such an age the triumph of the pen
Is poor indeed to poor and pensive men.
And yet my pen finds something still to fee it.
Though mean my name, yet you desire to see it.