Oliver Wendell Holmes

Here you will find the Poem Cacoethes Scribendi of poet Oliver Wendell Holmes

Cacoethes Scribendi

If all the trees in all the woods were men; 
 And each and every blade of grass a pen; 
 If every leaf on every shrub and tree 
 Turned to a sheet of foolscap; every sea 
 Were changed to ink, and all earth's living tribes 
 Had nothing else to do but act as scribes, 
 And for ten thousand ages, day and night, 
 The human race should write, and write, and write, 
 Till all the pens and paper were used up, 
 And the huge inkstand was an empty cup, 
 Still would the scribblers clustered round its brink 
 Call for more pens, more paper, and more ink.