ON A BUST

Your speeches seemed to answer for the nonce —

They do not justify your head in bronze!

Your essays! talent's failures were to you

Your philosophic gamut, but things true,

Or beautiful, oh never! What's the pons

For you to cross to fame?— Your head in bronze?

What has the artist caught? The sensual chin

That melts away in weakness from the skin,

Sagging from your indifference of mind;

The sullen mouth that sneers at human kind

For lack of genius to create or rule;

The superficial scorn that says “you fool!”

The deep-set eyes that have the mud-cat look

Which might belong to Tolstoi or a crook.

The nose half-thickly fleshed and half in point,

And lightly turned awry as out of joint;

The eyebrows pointing upward satyr-wise,

Scarce like Mephisto, for you scarcely rise

To cosmic irony in what you dream —

More like a tomcat sniffing yellow cream.

The brow!‘ Tis worth the bronze it's molded in

Save for the flat-top head and narrow thin

Backhead which shows your spirit has not soared.

You are a Packard engine in a Ford,

Which wrecks itself and turtles with its load,

Too light and powerful to keep the road.

The master strength for twisting words is caught

In the swift turning wheels of iron thought.

With butcher knives your hands can vivisect

Our butterflies, but you can not erect

Temples of beauty, wisdom. You can crawl

Hungry and subtle over Eden's wall,

And shame half grown up truth, or make a lie

Full grown as good. You cannot glorify

Our dreams, or aspirations, or deep thirst.

To you the world's a fig tree which is curst.

You have preached every faith but to betray;

The artist shows us you have had your day.

A giant as we hoped, in truth a dwarf;

A barrel of slop that shines on Lethe's wharf,

Which seemed at first a vessel with sweet wine

For thirsty lips. So down the swift decline

You went through sloven spirit, craven heart

And cynic indolence. And here the art

Of molding clay has caught you for the nonce

And made your shame our shame — your head in bronze!

Some day this bust will lie amid old metals

Old copper boilers, wires, faucets, kettles.

Some day it will be melted up and molded

In door knobs, inkwells, paper knives, or folded

In leaves and wreaths around the capitals

Of marble columns, or for arsenals

Fashioned in something, or in course of time

Successively made each of these, from grime

Rescued successively, or made a bell

For fire or worship, who on earth can tell?

One thing is sure, you will not long be dust

When this bronze will be broken as a bust

And given to the junkman to re-sell.

You know this and the thought of it is hell!