Oh happy time! — Art’s early days!
When o’er each deed, with sweet self-praise,
Narcissus-like I hung!
When great Rembrandt but little seemed,
And such Old Masters all were deemed
As nothing to the young!
Some scratchy strokes — abrupt and few,
So easily and swift I drew,
Sufficed for my design;
My sketchy, superficial hand
Drew solids at a dash — and spanned
A surface with a line.
Not long my eye was thus content,
But grew more critical — my bent
Essayed a higher walk;
I copied leaden eyes in lead —
Rheumatic hands in white and red,
And gouty feet — in chalk.
Anon my studious art for days
Kept making faces — happy phrase,
For faces such as mine!
Accomplished in the details then,
I left the minor parts of men,
And drew the form divine.
Old Gods and Heroes — Trojan — Greek,
Figures — long after the antique,
Great Ajax justly feared;
Hectors, of whom at night I dreamt,
And Nestor, fringed enough to tempt
Bird-nesters to his beard.
A Bacchus, leering on a bowl,
A Pallas that out-stared her owl,
A Vulcan — very lame;
A Dian stuck about with stars,
With my right hand I murdered Mars —
(One Williams did the same).
But tired of this dry work at last,
Crayon and chalk aside I cast,
And gave my brush a drink!
Dipping —“as when a painter dips
In gloom of earthquake and eclipse,”—
That is — in Indian ink.
Oh then, what black Mont Blancs arose,
Crested with soot, and not with snows:
What clouds of dingy hue!
In spite of what the bard has penned,
I fear the distance did not “lend
Enchantment to the view.”
Not Radcliffe’s brush did e’er design
Black Forests half so black as mine,
Or lakes so like a pall;
The Chinese cake dispersed a ray
Of darkness, like the light of Day
And Martin over all.
Yet urchin pride sustained me still,
I gazed on all with right good will,
And spread the dingy tint;
“No holy Luke helped me to paint,
The devil surely, not a Saint,
Had any finger in’t!”
But colors came! — like morning light,
With gorgeous hues, displacing night,
Or Spring’s enlivened scene:
At once the sable shades withdrew;
My skies got very, very blue;
My trees extremely green.
And washed by my cosmetic brush,
How Beauty’s cheek began to blush;
With lock of auburn stain —
(Not Goldsmith’s Auburn)— nut-brown hair,
That made her loveliest of the fair;
Not “loveliest of the plain!”
Her lips were of vermilion hue:
Love in her eyes, and Prussian blue,
Set all my heart in flame!
A young Pygmalion, I adored
The maids I made — but time was stored
With evil — and it came!
Perspective dawned — and soon I saw
My houses stand against its law;
And “keeping” all unkept!
My beauties were no longer things
For love and fond imaginings;
But horrors to be wept!
Ah! why did knowledge ope my eyes?
Why did I get more artist wise?
It only serves to hint,
What grave defects and wants are mine;
That I’m no Hilton in design —
In nature no De Wint!
Thrice happy time! — Art’s early days!
When o’er each deed, with sweet self-praise,
Narcissus-like I hung!
When great Rembrandt but little seemed,
And such Old Masters all were deemed
As nothing to the young!