Could I hit on a theme + 

To fashion my verse on, + 

Not long would I seem + 

A lack-courtesy person. + 

But I have not the skill, + 

Nor talisman strong, + 

To summon at will + 

The Spirit of song.⁠— + 

Bright thoughts are roaming + 

Unseen in the air; + 

Like comets, their coming + 

Is sudden and rare. + 

They strike, and they enter, + 

And light up the brain, + 

Which thrills to its centre + 

With rapturous pain. + 

Where the chance-seed + 

Is piously nursed, + 

Brighter succeed + 

In the path of the first.⁠— + 

One sighs to the Muse, + 

Or the sweet nightingale, + 

One sips the night-dews + 

Which moon-beams exhale. + 

All this is a fiction; + 

I never could find + 

A suitable friction + 

To frenzy my mind. + 

What use are empirics? + 

No gas on their shelf + 

Can make one spout lyrics + 

In spite of oneself! + 