In mute Poe’s eyes I see dire Usher sink,
Loud Shaw and G.K. take each other to task?
Says Poe: Amontillado? Here’s the Casque,
Cap on these bells, while I a mortar mix
To stash these madmen in a cell of bricks.
Thus I in shames, all shambles, keep my peace
As all these angel souls their wings release.
The air is battered by these airborne goats
Who leap and clamber, music in their throats,
Such sweet enchantments! harken to their gab!
Their locomotive thunders shake our cab.
To sound us from the station, what a mix
Of clangor-dins from these most glorious Six.
Their conversation showers me with chat
Till Shaw corks all to point where Truth is at,
Then Chesterton orates the great I Am
Nor shuts for tea and tarts (the last with jam).
And silent midst the rest, now witness Poe.
He dreams himself found dead in winter snow?
While Wilde a beggar starves in Paris keep
And Melville dies on land while critics sleep.
O damn those soul-survivors, why’s it so?
That wise men then knew not what we now know?
To tape a Whale but never know its size
And measure Poe but seldom toss him prize?
How laugh at Wilde who now must laugh at you?
I often wonder just what critics do?
I know they read but wonder if they think?
I sip on wine while they the other drink,
But from the selfsame fount, then can it be