This week’s poems are three riddles written by Jonathan Swift. I wonder how many you can guess.

Jonathan Swift was a master of satire and is perhaps best known now for Gulliver’s Travels which satirises human nature; he wrote many other polemical works, including “The Drapier’s Letters”—a series of pamphlets criticising the granting of a government monopoly for producing copper coins to a private businessman—the more things change, the more they stay the same… The Drapier’s Letters (which Swift issued anonymously, posing as a draper) swayed public opinion so effectively that the government offered an award to anyone prepared to identify the author, though nobody took up the offer. The patent was eventually rescinded and the coins (which could only have generated profit for the businessman if he had debased them with other metals) kept out of circulation. Swift saw this as one of his greatest achievements.

Swift’s other well-known polemic was “A Modest Proposal for Preventing the Children of Poor People in Ireland Being a Burden on Their Parents or Country, and for Making Them Beneficial to the Publick” in which he deliberately proposes the argument that the Irish poor should improve their lot by selling their offspring to rich people for food. In this way he satirises the attitude of the English rulers of Ireland, many of them absentee landlords, pretending to deride more sensible reforms in favour of his extreme solution.

Poem 157. Riddle 1

My parent and I produce one another,
The mother the daughter, the daughter the mother.

Jonathan Swift (1667—1745)

From Heaven I fall, though from earth I begin,
No lady alive can show such a skin.
I’m bright as an angel, and light as a feather,
But heavy and dark, when you squeeze me together.
Though candour and truth in my aspect I bear,
Yet many poor creatures I help to ensnare.
Though so much of Heaven appears in my make,
The foulest impressions I easily take.
My parent and I produce one another,
The mother the daughter, the daughter the mother.

Swift’s command of the English language is demonstrated superbly here—he uses as many synonyms as he can for his subject without directly naming it. I like “I’m bright as an angel, and light as a feather, but heavy and dark when you squeeze me together,” and “My parent and I produce one another, the mother the daughter, the daughter the mother.”

Poem 158. Riddle 2

Many to our counters run,
Some are made, and some undone

Jonathan Swift (1667—1745)

We are little brethren twain,
Arbiters of loss and gain,
Many to our counters run,
Some are made, and some undone:
But men find it to their cost,
Few are made, but numbers lost.
Though we play them tricks for ever,
Yet they always hope our favour.

This is a shorter riddle and perhaps it’s easier to get the answer, but it still demonstrates the author’s facility with language.

Poem 159. Riddle 3

A new and wondrous art I show
Of raising spirits from below;
In scarlet some, and some in white;

Jonathan Swift (1667—1745)

Though I, alas! a prisoner be,
My trade is prisoners to set free.
No slave his lord’s commands obeys
With such insinuating ways.
My genius piercing, sharp, and bright,
Wherein the men of wit delight.
The clergy keep me for their ease,
And turn and wind me as they please.
A new and wondrous art I show
Of raising spirits from below;
In scarlet some, and some in white;
They rise, walk round, yet never fright.
In at each mouth the spirits pass,
Distinctly seen as through a glass:
O’er head and body make a rout,
And drive at last all secrets out;
And still, the more I show my art,
The more they open every heart.

A greater chemist none than I
Who, from materials hard and dry,
Have taught men to extract with skill
More precious juice than from a still.

Although I’m often out of case,
I’m not ashamed to show my face.
Though at the tables of the great
I near the sideboard take my seat;
Yet the plain ‘squire, when dinner’s done,
Is never pleased till I make one;
He kindly bids me near him stand,
And often takes me by the hand.

I twice a-day a-hunting go;
Nor ever fail to seize my foe;
And when I have him by the poll,
I drag him upwards from his hole;
Though some are of so stubborn kind,
I’m forced to leave a limb behind.

I hourly wait some fatal end;
For I can break, but scorn to bend.

This is another clever riddle that gives plenty of clues to the subject without giving it away.