Feasts

I drink the gall of skies in autumn, tuberoses' Sweet bitterness in your betrayals burning stream; I drink the gall of nights, of crowded parties' noises, Of sobbing virgin verse, and of a throbbing dream. We fiends of studious fight a battle everlasting Against our daily bread - can't stand the sober mood. The troubled wind of nights is merely a toastmaster Whose toasts, as like as not, will do no one much good. Heredity and death are our guests at table. A quiet dawn will paint bright-red the tops of trees. An anapaest, like mice, will on the bread-plate scrabble, And Cinderella will rush in to change her dress. The floors have all been swept, and everything is dainty, And like a child's sweet kiss, breathes quietly my verse, And Cinderella flees-by cab on days of plenty, And on shanks' pony when the last small coin is lost.