Explore "When I do Mock" by James Whitcomb Riley on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
When I do mock the blackness of the night / With my despair-outweep the very dews / And wash my wan cheeks stark of all delight, / Denying every counsel of dear use / In mine embittered state; with infinite / Perversity, mine eyes drink in no sight / Of pleasance that nor moon nor stars refuse / In silver largess and gold twinklings bright; - / I question me what mannered brain is mine / That it doth trick me of the very food / It panteth for-the very meat and wine / That yet should plump my starved soul with good / And comfortable plethora of ease, / That I might drowse away such rhymes as these.