Read "Dedicatory Ode" by Hilaire Belloc online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
I mean to write with all my strength / (It lately has been sadly waning), / A ballad of enormous length -- / Some parts of which will need explaining.[1]
Because (unlike the bulk of men / Who write for fame or public ends), / I turn a lax and fluent pen / To talking of my private friends.[2]