The Lake Isle

     O God, O Venus, O Mercury, patron of thieves,
    Give me in due time, I beseech you, a little tobacco-shop,
    With the little bright boxes
                piled up neatly upon the shelves
    And the loose fragment cavendish
                and the shag,
    And the bright Virginia
                loose under the bright glass cases,
    And a pair of scales
             not too greasy,
 And the votailles dropping in for a word or two in passing,
 For a flip word, and to tidy their hair a bit.

     O God, O Venus, O Mercury, patron of thieves,
 Lend me a little tobacco-shop,
             or install me in any profession
 Save this damn’d profession of writing,
             where one needs one’s brains all the time.