Rupert Chawner Brooke


Sonnet: in Time of Revolt


   The Thing must End. I am no boy! I am
    No BOY! I being twenty-one. Uncle, you make
    A great mistake, a very great mistake,
   In chiding me for letting slip a "Damn!"
   What's more, you called me "Mother's one ewe
         lamb,"
    Bade me "refrain from swearing--for her sake--
    Till I'm grown up"... --By God! I think you
         take
   Too much upon you, Uncle William!

   You say I am your brother's only son.
   I know it. And, "What of it?" I reply.
   My heart's resolved. Something must be done.
   So shall I curb, so baffle, so suppress
   This too avuncular officiousness,
   Intolerable consanguinity.

January 1908




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