Borrow’d Plumes

A poem by Adam Lindsay Gordon

A Preface and a Piracy


Prologue

Of borrow’d plumes I take the sin,
My extracts will apply
To some few silly songs which in
These pages scatter’d lie.

The words are Edgar Allan Poe’s,
As any man may see,
But what a Poet wrote in prose,
Shall make blank verse for me.



These trifles are collected and republished chiefly with a view
to their redemption from the many improvements to which
they have been subjected while going at random the rounds of the Press.
I am naturally anxious that what I have written should circulate
as I wrote it, if it circulate at all. * * * * * * In defence
of my own taste, nevertheless, it is incumbent upon me to say that I think
nothing in this volume of much value to the public, or very creditable
to myself.
E. A. P.
(See Preface to Poe’s Poetical Works.)



Epilogue

And now that my theft stands detected,
The first of my extracts may call
To some of the rhymes here collected
Your notice, the second to all.

Ah! friend, you may shake your head sadly,
Yet this much you’ll say for my verse,
I’ve written of old something badly,
But written anew something worse.