Let meaner men the poet’s bays
Or warrior’s medal wear;
Who cooks potatoes fifty ways
Shall bear the palm—de terre.
What! photograph in colors? ’Tis a dream
And he who dreams it is not overwise,
If colors are vibration they but seem,
And have no being. But if Tyndall lies,
Why, come, then—photograph my lady’s eyes.
Nay, friend, you can’t; the splendor of their blue,
As on my own beclouded orbs they rest,
To naught but vibratory motion’s due,
As heart, head, limbs and all I am attest.
How could her eyes, at rest themselves, be making
In me so uncontrollable a shaking?
Over the man the street car ran,
And the driver did never grin.
“O killer of men, pray tell me when
Your laughter means to begin.
“Ten years to a day I’ve observed you slay,
And I never have missed before
Your jubilant peals as your crunching wheels
Were spattered with human gore.
“Why is it, my boy, that you smother your joy,
And why do you make no sign
Of the merry mind that is dancing behind
A solemner face than mine?”
The driver replied: “I would laugh till I cried
If I had bisected you;
But I’d like to explain, if I can for the pain,
’Tis myself that I’ve cut in two.”
Thy gift, if that it be of God,
Thou hast no warrant to appraise,
Nor say: “Here part, O Muse, our ways,
The road too stony to be trod.”
Not thine to call the labor hard
And the reward inadequate.
Who haggles o’er his hire with Fate
Is better bargainer than bard.
What! count the effort labor lost
When thy good angel holds the reed?
It were a sorry thing indeed
To stay him till thy palm be crossed.
“The laborer is worthy”—nay,
The sacred ministry of song
Is rapture!—’twere a grievous wrong
To fix a wages-rate for play.
“What is that, mother?”
“The humorist, child.
His hands are black, but his heart is mild.”
“May I touch him, mother?”
“ ’Twere needlessly done:
He is slightly touched already, my son.”
“O, why does he wear such a ghastly grin?”
“ ’Tis the outward sign of a joke within.”
“Will he crack it, mother?”
“Not so, my saint;
’Tis meant for the Saturday Livercomplaint.”
“Does he suffer, mother?”
“God help him, yes!—
A thousand and fifty kinds of distress.”
“What makes him sweat so?”
“The demons that lurk
In the fear of having to go to work.”
“Why doesn’t he end, then, his life with a rope?”
“Abolition of Hell has deprived him of hope.”
I saw—’twas in a dream the other night—
A man whose hair with age was thin and white:
One hundred years had bettered by his birth,
And still his step was firm, his eye was bright.
Before him and about him pressed a crowd.
Each head in reverence was bared and bowed,
And Jews and Gentiles in a hundred tongues
Extolled his deeds and spoke his fame aloud.
I joined the throng and, pushing forward, cried,
“Montefiore!” with the rest, and vied
In efforts to caress the hand that ne’er
To want and worth had charity denied.
So closely round him swarmed our shouting clan
He scarce could breathe, and taking from a pan
A gleaming coin, he tossed it o’er our heads,
And in a moment was a lonely man!
She:
I’m told that men have sometimes got
Too confidential, and
Have said to one another what
They—well, you understand.
I hope I don’t offend you, sweet,
But are you sure that you’re discreet?
He:
’Tis true, sometimes my friends in wine
Their conquests do recall,
But none can truly say that mine
Are known to him at all.
I never, never talk you o’er—
In truth, I never get the floor.
’Tis the census enumerator
A-singing all forlorn:
It’s ho! for the tall potater,
And ho! for the clustered corn.
The whiffle-tree bends in the breeze and the fine
Large eggs are a-ripening on the vine.
“Some there must be to till the soil
And the widow’s weeds keep down.
I wasn’t cut out for rural toil
But they won’t let me live in town!
They’re not so many by two or three,
As they think, but ah! they’re too many for me.”
Thus the census man, bowed down with care,
Warbled his wood-note high.
There was blood on his brow and blood in his hair,
But he had no blood in his eye.
Baffled he stands upon the track—
The automatic switches clack.
Where’er he turns his solemn eyes
The interlocking signals rise.
The trains, before his visage pale,
Glide smoothly by, nor leave the rail.
No splinter-spitted victim he
Hears uttering the note high C.
In sorrow deep he hangs his head,
A-weary—would that he were dead.
Now suddenly his spirits rise—
A great thought kindles in his eyes.
Hope, like a headlight’s vivid glare,
Splendors the path of his despair.
His genius shines, the clouds roll back—
“I’ll place obstructions on the track!”
Newman, in you two parasites combine:
As tapeworm and as graveworm too you shine.
When on the virtues of the quick you’ve dwelt,
The pride of residence was all you felt
(What vain vulgarian the wish ne’er knew
To paint his lodging a flamboyant hue?)
And when the praises of the dead you’ve sung,
’Twas appetite, not truth, inspired your tongue;
As ill-bred men when warming to their wine
Boast of its merit though it be but brine.
Nor gratitude incites your song, nor should—
Even Charity would shun you if she could.
You share, ’tis true, the rich man’s daily dole,
But what you get you take by way of toll.
Vain to resist you—vermifuge alone
Has power to push you from your robber throne.
When to escape you he’s compelled to die
Hey! presto!—in the twinkling of an eye
You vanish as a tapeworm, reappear
As graveworm and resume your curst career.
As host no more, to satisfy your need
He serves as dinner your unaltered greed.
O thrifty sycophant of wealth and fame,
Son of servility and priest of shame,
While naught your mad ambition can abate
To lick the spittle of the rich and great;
While still like smoke your eulogies arise
To soot your heroes and inflame our eyes;
While still with holy oil, like that which ran
Down
