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.