Classic Poem

A RIDDLE .

  What is it that from youth to age
Can ever-green delights engage;
It is not love ; it is not health;
It is not beauty, rank, or wealth;
It is not eloquence , or parts;
It is not skill , or taste in arts .
Love is at home with boys and misses,
But makes a jest of ancient kisses:
Health , if she hunts, and breaks her neck,
May feel the gout her trophies check;
In age infirm, she doats at best,
Of all her frolicks dispossess'd:
The fading belle , her subjects flown,
Sighs for the abdicated throne:
To pain the Duke , a living martyr,
No anodyne can find the Garter:
Capricious wealth is either toss'd
In self-indulgence till it 's lost,
Or views, unbless'd, the hoarded pelf
That lies for ever on the shelf:
The orator , that blazing meteor,
Ends in a dull and prosing creature:
A fool the man of parts can cheat,
For parts can seldom be discreet:
The touch mechanic and expert
In age no more can be alert:
The connoisseur will run to waste,
Or sicken from excess of taste.
 What is it, then, if none of these,
That still can interest and please?
Exempt from flannels and the nurse,
From Time's decay, and Fortune's curse?
It is— you 'll guess—perhaps you know it,
Your own bright fancy as a Poet.