An Italian Chest

Lust is the oldest lion of them all

And he shall have first place,

With a malignant growl, satirical,

To curve in foliations prodigal

Round and around his face,

Extending till the echoes interlace

With Pride and Prudence, two cranes, gaunt and tall.

Four lesser lions crouch and malign the cranes,

Cursing and gossiping they shake their manes

While from their long tongues leak

Drops of thin venom as they speak.

The cranes, unmoved, peck grapes and grains

From a huge cornucopia, which rains

A plenteous meal from its antique

Interior ( a note quite curiously Greek ).

And nine long serpents twist

And twine, twist and twine,

A riotously beautiful design

Whose elements consist

Of eloquent spirals, fair and fine,

Embracing cranes and lions, who exist

Seemingly free, yet tangled in that living vine.

And in this chest shall be

Two cubic meters of space

Enough to hold all memory

Of you and me —

And this shall be the place

Where silence shall embrace

Our bodies, and obliterate the trace

Our souls made on the purity

Of night...

Now lock the chest, for we

Are dead, and lose the key!