1. The rhymester found the path to reproach clear,
So he smoothed your rugged offenses into gentle slopes.

2. Why should I stir your dormant loyalty,
And shake off from you pure clarity but little?

3. Prolonged hope for a beloved who never changes
Remains guarded in me while in you given.

4. So how long will your reproach raise a storm,
And sharpen it as words against me and tales?

5. Each day an incursion that does not end
Except to sheathe his sword made blunt.

6. Truly he who sought praise voraciously
More deserves to find censure his companion.

7. How many compositions have my anxieties strewn
Until I wove exoneration into them excessively?

8. And poems I buttressed sturdily
And publicized them ships and convoys.

9. They were made streams for the tinkle of joy
To hearts, and for sorrows an open road.