The Sentimental Gardener

ONCE there was a Gardener,
Who sang all day a dirge to his poor flowers:
He often stooped and kissed 'em

After thunder-showers:
His nerves were delicate, though fresh air is deemed a
hardener

Of the human system 1
Many a moon went over,
And still his death-bell tale was told and tolled,

His tears, like rain in Winter,
Dribbling slow and cold,
Void the song itself; I send it under cover

To my Leipsic printer.
"Weary! I am weary!
No rest from raking till I reach my goal I

Here, like a tulip trampled,
Lose I heart and soul;
Sure such a Death-in-Life as mine, — so dark, so dreary,

Must be unexampled!
Hence, when droughty weather
Has dulled the spirits of my violets,

Medrearns I feel as though I
Should have slight regrets
Were they and I just then to droop and die together,

Watched and wept by no eye.
O, gazelle-eyed Princess!
Grand daughter of the Sultan of Cathay!

The Knave of Spades beseeches
Thee by night and day:
He dies to lay before thee samples of his quinces,

Apricots and peaches!
Questionless Thy Highness
Must wonder why I play the Absent Man;

Yet, if I pitch my lonely
Tent in Frank istan,
Attribute, O, Full Moon! the blame, not to my shyness,

But my planet only.
But, enough! I'll smother
My groanings — and myself. Were I a Free

Kix-Baron or a Markgrave,
I would fly to thee,
But since — alas, my stars! — I am neither one nor t'other,
Here I'll dig my dark grave!"