Classic Poem

Ladies and gentlemen of Mere, once more ye
See I am come to make my bow before ye.
How are ye all! I've wandered many miles
Since last I shared your kind approving smiles.
And, having been so well received before,
I have presumed to visit you once more,
Hoping (and it is not a vain hope is it?)
That you will frequently return the visit,
And when you want a change your minds to cheer
You'll come and spend a cheerful evening here,
That is if I should be at home, for my days
For seeing company are Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays.
I think that when you shall have spent with me
A night or two you'll like my company.
To give you pleasure we'll leave nothing undone.
We've comedies and farces new from London;
We've love and courtship, marriages and dances,
To please the younger people's lively fancies;
And noble pieces of the graver kinds
To feed the sages' moralizing minds;
And, to prevent all weariness and spleen,
We'll often treat you with a change of scene.
Here you with kings and noblemen may sit,
And statesmen too — at least we have a Pit,
Or if you think that such men are too high,
We'll give you Blackeyed Susan or Paul Pry .
Then let us, for a while, your favors share.
Although bad characters we sometimes bear,
Of one mean action no one can us tax;
Though all allow that we perform good acts.
Come patronize us during our short stay,
And I, in gratitude, will ever pray,
Until the curtain of my life shall fall,
That Providence may save and bless you all.