Classic Poem

Gentle is Nerva, and his tongue doth shrink
Too modestly to show her proper skill,
And he that might have drained Permessus' rill
Constrained his thirst and sipped the very brink;

And though his brow wear but a sprig of bay,
And though he will not woo the breeze of fame,
Yet him doth learned Nero's verse acclaim
And greet him the Tibullus of to-day.