The Price Poem by John A. Hancock

Whispers melancholy's bane
Subtle words of gloom
Whilst I ponder Poe he must
The days ahead that loom
O' favor'd slumber when'st in thy realm
My darkest secrets to you confess
When night abates the trying day
And sleep my thoughts possess
My torment Cowper names thee kin
As misery clouds my Fett'd mind
Dragging out the days that pass
Ere the stars at night they shine
For what is madness but a key
To unlock a poet's mind
And free the prosily words within
Love and pain doth turn to rhyme
Alas all to short the dream of bards
Ere comes the breaking dawn
To stir to life in the waning hours
This malady my sanity preys upon