Retribution

How I did hold in deep contempt

   The slaves and queens of love! 

How I disguised my feelings when 

    I met a deer or a dove! 

How I did smile and sniff and rail 

    At lovers young and old; 

How I denied, in days gone by, 

    O love, thy charms untold! 

But now, alas! I find myself 

    In chains at Beauty's shrine: 

The chains whose power I have denied

   Are sapping, sapping mine.