Stanzas on Poetics of Class
On some God smiles, whilst others get but spit;
Some live as if they’d never left the womb:
Without the slightest need to whore their wit
Or body: from the cradle to the tomb
Fed, clothed, insured, and all that comes with it;
And yet they often envy those on whom
That smile did never shine, who bit by bit
And day by day consume the rationed doom,
Whose lives are but a preview of the Pit
Albeit not the whole pile, just that room
Described by Dante as the entrance hall
With cheerful sign ‘Through to No Hope. At all’.
This paradox, or riddle if you please,
Has been the toil of life for many sage
And very curious men, who with some ease
And grace could have explained all that their Age
Held worth explaining; just as I would sneeze,
Or scratch my ear, so they’d unlock the cage
Of mystery, and free the truth. It is
A perfect intellectual outrage,
A quite abominable fact, that these
Learned men, who wrote a thousand and one page,
And others, a whole lot more stupid, couldn’t
Explain why people envy, when they shouldn’t.
In this third stanza of my poem which
You’ve never, gentle reader, read before,
And I much doubt will read again, I’ll screech
About a different subject – a great foe
Of humans, that intolerable itch
From which each poet, starting from Sappho,
Who wisely noted: ‘Life is nought but bitch’,
Ending with Auden, who called it ‘a bore’,
Did suffer greatly – The Desire to Teach…
Alas! no space left here. Forth, stanza Four!
(I’d sing self-praise to deafen the humanity
If I’d had but an ounce of pride or vanity.)
So here is the New Age Decalogue,
That is to say – Ten Don’ts for modern days:
Thou shall not keep thy feelings under lock
And key; Thou shall not try to beat an ace
With thy Cartier, nor with a mantle clock;
Don’t bet each-way on a two-runner race,
And never bet at Ayr. You’d be a shmok
To mix Cognac with vodka - ‘tis disgrace;
Don’t promise ten when there's just eight in stock;
Do not attempt to swap your rightful place
Or station in relation to the stairs;
And above all – do not read silly verse!
(Îïóáëèêîâàíî 03-Nov-05) Îòçûâû: 11
Ññûëêà: http://kotlet.net/article.php?story=20051103135314801
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