Words of the Week #17

Helicon’s latest edition “Lost and Found” is taking shape as we speak and throughout the last previous weeks, in between the editor meeting and final choices for the front cover, this particular poem has been playing in the back of my mind.

Right now, when we are so close to publishing this year’s first copy of Helicon, it seems an apt moment to present “The Author to Her Book” by Anne Bradstreet for this” Words of the Week” post.

Make sure to pick up a copy of the latest Helicon Magazine in and around Bristol soon!!

The Author To Her Book

Thou ill-form’d 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 th’ 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 then is meet;

In better dress to trim thee was my mind,

But nought save home-spun 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.

Anne Bradstreet (1612-1672)