What time I pen the Mighty Line
Suffusid with the spark divine
As who should say: " By George! That's fine! "

Indignantly do I deny
The words of Arnold Bennett. Why,
Is this not English verse? say I.

And by the proceeds of that verse —
Such as, e.g. , these little terc-
Ets — is not filled the family purse?

Do we not live on what I sell,
Sonnet, ballade, and villanelle?
*****

" We do, " She says, " and none too well. "