Works of Frederick Engels, 1839

To The Bremen Courier ^[25]

Written:about April 27, 1839

First published:in the Bremisches Unterhaltungsblatt No. 34, April 27, 1839

Dear Bremen Courier,

Please don’t be offended

If you've become the laughing-stock of town.

Remember, friend, that folk have always tended

To ridicule what’s patently unsound.

Your sunshine days have very nearly ended

In the three months that you've been trotting round.

Have you been saying things you didn’t ought,

To give yourself such food for afterthoughts

My poems cost little effort when I did them;

The donkey work was almost wholly done.

I took your articles and parodied them;

The subject-matter came from you alone.

Simply subtract the rhyme-schemes and the rhythm —

The image that remains is all your own.

Rage, if you like, at your respectful and

Obedient servant,

Theodor Hildebrand