 |
| Source: Clements Library Chronicles |
Anne Bradstreet
| THOU ill-formed offspring of my feeble brain, | |
| Who after birth didst by my side remain | |
| Till snatched from thence by friends less wise than true | |
| Who thee abroad exposed to public view, | |
| Made thee, in rags, halting, to the press to trudge, | |
| Where errors were not lessened, all may judge, | |
| At thy return my blushing was not small, | |
| My rambling brat—in print—should mother call. | |
| I cast thee by as one unfit for light, | |
| Thy visage was so irksome in my sight; | |
| Yet being mine own, at length affection would | |
| Thy blemishes amend, if so I could. | |
| I washed thy face, but more defects I saw, | |
| And rubbing off a spot still made a flaw. | |
| I stretched thy joints to make thee even feet, | |
| Yet still thou run’st more hobbling than is meet. | |
| In better dress to trim thee was my mind, | |
| But naught save homespun cloth i’ th’ house I find. | |
| In this array ’mongst vulgars mayst thou roam, | |
| In critics’ hands beware thou dost not come, | |
| And take thy way where yet thou art not known. | |
| If for thy father asked, say thou hadst none; | |
| And for thy mother, she, alas, is poor, | |
| Which caused her thus to send thee out of door. |
Source:
Colonial Prose and Poetry
Edited by William P. Trent and Benjamin W. Wells
The 57 writers in these three volumes spanning more than a century and a half represent the literary and cultural trends in Colonial North America—from the confrontation with the American Indians to Puritan life to opposition to slavery.
NEW YORK: THOMAS Y. CROWELL & Co., 1901
NEW YORK: BARTLEBY.COM, 2010
In the earlier period men lived earnestly if not largely, they thought highly if not broadly, they felt nobly if not always with magnanimity.—Preface Trent and Wells
