“Where now I gnaw on this crumbling wood.
“For men and their works are a feast for me—
“The bones, and the noose, and the gallows tree.”
A Song of Cheer
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The lords of Greenwich sallied forth
The men, also the maids;
The dames had cut and combed their hair,
The men wore theirs in braids.
They came unto a comrade's room,
They laid on him their hands
Said they, "Oh fiend, oh cringing wretch!
"Behold the traitor stands!"
They punched him thrice upon the nose,
They blacked his gleaming eye;
They nailed his trousers to the wall
And left him there to die.
But people came and cut him down
And gave him other pants.
"And tell us now," the people said
"How this thing came to chance?"
"Alas for me!" the wretch replied,
"My sinful lust for gold!
"My former friends are down on me—
I wrote a book that sold!"
A Song of College
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Now is chapel gathered, now the seats are full,
Now the goodly president upon his hind legs rises
Launching on a discourse for the great god Bull,
Praising wealth and civic pride and other things he prizes.
While the chapel listens, smug and belly full
And the organ chants a ditty to the great god Bull.
Now the goodly resident waving arms in air
Blesses all the godly men who’ve strewn our land with roses.
O’er his shoulder hordes of ghosts nod and smirk and stare
As his words place chaplets fair on their Jewish noses.
And they smirk and they stare, each a chaplet on his skull,
Testifying power of the great god Bull.
Now the faculty arises to bray across the hall,
Each with high and weighty problems to present before their classes;
Was it wine or apple brandy Noah guzzled to his fall?
Shall we advocate striped trousers for the masses?
Each and every student falls silent then to mull
On the glory and the wisdom of the great god Bull.
And now they rise with deference and to their class rooms go
With sawdust, smoke and hokum to cram each empty skull,
And the teachers serve manure into hands sedate and slow
And all of them burn incense to the great god Bull.
Glory to the dollar! The colleges are full
Of students burning incense to the great god Bull.
A Song of Greenwich
Table of Contents
The lords of Greenwich sallied forth
The men, also the maids;
The dames had cut and combed their hair,
The men wore theirs in braids.
They came unto a comrade’s room,
They laid on him their hands
Said they, “Oh fiend, oh cringing wretch!
“Behold the traitor stands!”
They punched him thrice upon the nose,
They blacked his gleaming eye;
They nailed his trousers to the wall
And left him there to die.
But people came and cut him down
And gave him other pants.
“And tell us now,” the people said
“How this thing came to chance?”
“Alas for me!” the wretch replied,
“My sinful lust for gold!
“My former friends are down on me—
I wrote a book that sold!”
The Song of the Bats
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The dusk was on the mountain
And the stars were dim and frail
When the bats came flying, flying
From the river and the vale
To wheel against the twilight
And sing their witchy tale.
"We were kings of old!" they chanted,
"Rulers of a world enchanted;
"Every nation of creation
"Owned our lordship over men.
"Diadems of power crowned us,
"Then rose Solomon to confound us,
"In the form of beasts he bound us,
"So our rule was broken then."
Whirling, wheeling into westward,
Fled they in their phantom flight;
Was it but a wing-beat music
Murmured through the star-gemmed night?
Or the singing of a ghost clan
Whispering of forgotten might?
The Song of the Sage
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Thus spoke Scutto on the mountains in the twilight,
Sage and seer and councilor to lords of Hindustand,
“Life,my bold young bastards, according to my light,
“Is but a bucking galley by a band of monkeys manned.”
A Song Out of Midian
Table of Contents
And a purple woven Tyrian smock, and wine from a pirate's hold.
Kings shall kneel at your feet, Astair, emperors kiss your hand;
Captive girls for your joy shall dance, slim and straight as a striking lance,
Who tremble and bow at your mildest glance and kneel at your least command.
Galleys shall break the crimson seas seeking delights for you;
With silks and silvery fountain gleams I will weave a world that glows and seems
A shimmering mist of rainbow dreams, scarlet and white and blue.
Or is it glory you wish, Astair, the crash and the battle-flame?
The winds shall break on the warship's sail and Death ride free at my horse's tail,
Till all the tribes of the earth shall wail at the terror of your name.
I will break the thrones of the world, Astair, and fling them at your feet;
Flame and banners and doom shall fly, and my iron chariots rend the sky,
Whirlwind on whirlwind heaping high, death and a deadly sleet.
