Verse > William Blake > Poetical Works
Songs from ‘An Island in The Moon’
I. Little Phoebus came strutting in
(MS. circa 1784) 1

LITTLE PHOEBUS came strutting in,
With his fat belly and his round chin
What is it you would please to have?
Ho! Ho!
I won’t let it go at only so and so!        5
Note 1. The songs in this section are taken from the unfinished MS., without title but known as An Island in the Moon, where they are sung by some of the characters in that quaint satirical brochure. Among them, for the sake of completeness, I include a few pieces of intentional doggerel, omitting only three fragments which were not written by Blake, and the early versions of three of the Songs of Innocence, the variant readings of which are given elsewhere in the footnotes.
  I and II] Sung by Quid the Cynic, MS., chap. iii. [back]
