Avaunt! arch enemy of fun, Grim nightmare of the mind;Which way great Momus! shall I run, A refuge safe to find?My puppy's dead -- Miss Rumor's breath Is stopt for lack of news,And Fitz is almost hyp'd to death, And Lang has got the blues.
I've read friend Noah's book quite thro' Appendix, notes and all;I've swallowed Lady Morgan's too, And blundered through De Stael:The Edinburg Review .- I've seen't The last that has been shipt;I've read -- in short -- all books in print, And some in manuscript.
I'm sick of General Jackson's toast, Canals are nought to me :Nor do I care who rules the roast Clinton -- or John Targee:No stock in any Bank I own, I fear no Lottery sharkAnd if the Battery were gone, I'd ramble in the Park.
Let gilded Guardsmen shake their toes, Let Altorf please the pit,Let Mister Hawkins "blow his nose" And Spooner publish it:Insolvent laws let Marshall break, Let dying Baldwin cavil;And let tenth ward electors shake Committees to the devil.
In vain -- for like a cruel cat That sucks a child to death,Or like a Madagascar bat, Who poisons with his breath,The fiend the fiend is on me still; Come, doctor! .- here's your pay --What lotion, potion, plaster, pill, Will drive the beast away?
