1850
                                   ELIZABETH
                               by Edgar Allan Poe
ELIZABETH
 
  Elizabeth, it surely is most fit
  [Logic and common usage so commanding]
  In thy own book that first thy name be writ,
  Zeno and other sages notwithstanding;
  And I have other reasons for so doing
  Besides my innate love of contradiction;
  Each poet - if a poet - in pursuing
  The muses thro' their bowers of Truth or Fiction,
  Has studied very little of his part,
  Read nothing, written less - in short's a fool
  Endued with neither soul, nor sense, nor art,
  Being ignorant of one important rule,
  Employed in even the theses of the school-
  Called - I forget the heathenish Greek name
  [Called anything, its meaning is the same]
  "Always write first things uppermost in the heart."
 
                                    THE END