Tobacco

This Indian weed, that once did grow
On fair Virginia's fertile plain,
From whence it came--again may go,
To please some happier swain:
Of all the plants that Nature yields
This, least beloved, shall shun my fields.

In evil hour I first essayed
To chew this vile forbidden leaf,
When, half ashamed, and half afraid,
I touched, and tasted--to my grief:
Ah me! the more I was forbid,
The more I wished to take a quid.

But when I smoaked, in thought profound,
And raised the spiral circle high,
My heart grew sick, my head turned round--
And what can all this mean, (said I)--
Tobacco surely was designed
To poison, and destroy mankind.

Unhappy they, whom choice, or fate
Inclines to prize this bitter weed;
Perpetual source of female hate;
On which no beast--but man will feed;
That sinks my heart, and turns my head,
And sends me, reeling, home to bed!