Success

Although I should not boast, I can be proud
To say my sonnets have had some effect;
Not that all who read them have been wowed,
Nor that their satisfaction is unchecked.
Rather, when reread they seem to do
Roughly what, artistically, I want,
Though some are fatted with a verbal stew
And others too reduced, too lean, too gaunt.
Yet in the main they seem to tread the mean
Between an under- and an overdone;
And those reactions I have chanced to glean
Are what I wanted when they were begun,
Or close, at least. And so, in happiness,
I may declare I have had some success.