Advice to the Grub Street Verse-writers
Swift offers humorous advice to aspiring poets. He advises them to have their poems printed and then to hand them off to a man named Pope who will scrawl his notes in the margins. After he has thoroughly picked the poems apart, retrieve them and have the edited version published without crediting Pope.
The Beasts' Confession
A priest listens to various animals confess before them. The idea is that, like humans, the animals often neglect to note what their greatest talents are. As the poem progresses, however, the reader quickly learns that the animals are of the opinion that whatever the humans suspect their greatest flaw to be it is actually their greatest strength.
A Beautiful Young Nymph Going to Bed
Corinna is a nymph who catches all the men's eyes, but she is a bit of a fraud. Every night when she climbs into her high bower she undresses and undoes to reveal quite a different type of being than she pretends to be. In fact all of her beauty is borrowed from bits and pieces glued and stuffed here and there. She sleeps fitfully, dreaming of far off places, before she wakes and manages, every morning, to put the pieces back together again.
A Description of a City Shower
Swift notes how the city changes when it rains. First, there are signs that the rain is coming: animals changing their habits, physical ailments returning etc. Then the people almost subconsciously choose to lead their day a little different than normal. Tempers flare. Then, as it begins to sprinkle everyone looks for shelter. As the rain increases, the flood fills the streets and washes out all the refuse in the streets.
A Description of the Morning
In order of importance, Swift relates who awakens at what hour: businessmen in carriages, the mistress of the house, the hired boy, the coal man, the chimney, sweep, the schoolboys, etc. They all have a task to tend early in the morning. Consistent throughout these descriptions, each one pursues their task in a solitary fashion, eager to anticipate when others will approach.
