I.
I’ve seen a man of threadbare garb
On a corner poorly play
With wormwood frayed and splintered harp
In imperfect rhyming way,
His pure discord cacophony
Entered and disgusted me,
Though held unto some music truth
Alike the harpist’s morose ruth –
The diff’rence betwixt only be
The latter’s missing of the “T” –
So, unto the holey, brazen cap
That sat within his boorish lap,
Dropped I a bill thus clipped in shape
To help him thus his dote escape;
But, nay, as a horse hungered for hay
Given unto oaten whey,
Did the dotard stand and say:
“Why do you add me dismay?”
Thinking quick for some just quip,
I defend my meager tip:
“Man, you see, it is July” –
Some confusion in his eye –
Which made him all the more jejune
As I left him with this rune.
II.
The hardened harpist under-bridge,
Biding out the windy rain,
Fighting off the biting midge,
Focused on his drear disdain,
Aware how dist from glee was he,
Gazed upon my runic “T” –
Confusion settled in his eye
To ponder my august reply –
When flashed and boomed a nearby bolt
Bringing him to with instant jolt,
Behooving he in quick limb limber,
And indeed did incept ember,
Which, as he was out of the rain,
Spread and fanned as feral train –
Then, all was plain!
“The only thing diff’rent’s a ‘T’” –
And now he could but plainly see
My monthly remedy.
III.
The fire under-bridge did grow,
So the harpist had to go,
Leaving in such hasty haste,
He felt lighter ’bout his waist,
Turning, standing in the pour,
Watched his harp burning so sore:
As the fire plucked its strings,
It let out its dying rings –
“Ah! So it is not just the ‘T’
But too an ‘S’ I am missing!
I do confess, ’twas a blessing
That that good man gave unto me:
My life’s answer’s an ‘S’ and ‘T’!”
IV.
Soon it all was conflagration,
He returned to contemplation,
Heading down the soggy street
When a sign his eyne did meet:
“October St.” it read,
As if by some author led;
It was too perfect to ignore
This kind of beaut’ous open door,
So down that road he turned alas
Anon feeling a bit less crass,
Until he found another same –
A harpist harping on his shame –
And, within the cap within his lap,
Tossed within the magic “T” –
His eyes looked up at the chap,
Then he knew quite instantly;
“Take your harp and burn it quick,
Then get up and follow me.”
So, the man, sensing no trick,
Arose and joined him down the street,
And it was not long to greet
More harpers to move their feet.
V.
By the end o’ October St.,
‘Twas six more they chanced to meet,
So that eight total they were
When a crowd started to stir:
“Arpeggio, where didst thou go?”
Cried one maid in fitful show;
Another, who was a fine artist:
“I cannot paint without harpist,
Whom to I ope my window wide
To let his sullen song inside,
Which, without, my canvas bare,
So, please, again alight thy chair,
And let not your sadness hide!”
The harpist leader came and said,
With his cap upon his head:
“No longer harps have we, you see;
They are burning to our glee,
And now we hear the great ‘ST’!”
Just then, a bell rang from a church
Nestled by a pallid birch,
And the gang was rapt to read,
As if by some author’s led,
Upon the church, the words written were:
“The Church of St. November.”
VI.
“This is it, my fellow men –
Our answer lies here within,
The holy ‘ST’ that brought us here
Soon shall make all things clear;
This door has terminated just
All the pathways by us rushed;
All our steps from very birth
Have been to bring us to this mirth;
So, be joyous, friends,
To our million pains a million ends –
We, who once on corners played,
Only by our squalor staid,
Those horrid harps that cried and creaked,
Through their strings our languor leaked,
Whose sound with such pain did abound,
To sympathize the coins there found
In our caps as off’ring plates,
Which barely stomach ever sates,
Leaving us hunger for much more
That food there never can implore;
Thus, is this place, my friends,
Where our spirits’ hunger ends;
Thus, is this church a sword
That the poorest can afford!”
VII.
Our gang opened up the door
In a moment years explore,
Finding there, upon a chair,
A harpist harping happily
Upon strings like golden hair –
Its wood stained the deepest hue;
Its sound did the soul imbue –
The playing man in whitest vest
Stopped and let the harp to rest,
Then turned unto our gang of friends
And spoke with voice of honeyed winds:
“Come, bring your harps and let us play.”
There were no words for them to say….
Then, the leader of the troupe
Told the story of the group,
Of how they burned their harps in glee,
Of the “S” and of the “T.”
Saint November’s eyes confuséd were,
Then his mouth started to stir:
“Men, I’ve no need of thee
If a harp I do not see,
So be away, please, anon,
For as surely as the dawn
Gently ends each gentle day,
With no harp you cannot play.”
VIII.
The eight left November’s church
And nestled down around the birch,
Speechless for a time they were,
Until the leader made a stir:
“There!
There’s the man who started this!
He sent us on this path,
And took away our harping bliss,
So let him hear our wrath!”
I heard him cry
While I was walking by:
“You there, man, our enemy,
Why’d you give of me the ‘T’?”
“Ah, yessir, the Arpeggio;
But, where did your harps to go?”
“We burned ’em by your wretch command;”
“Nay, sir, ’twas not as I planned;”
“Then, what plan was by the ‘T’?”
“‘Twas only of wordplay,
And for my own whim glee,
As betwixt ‘truth’ and ‘ruth’
But that letter is away.”
“Then, what of the ‘S’?”
“Sirs, I bless,
By the same game,
Though not my blame,
‘String’ and ‘ring’ –
Do you see? –
Differ by an ‘S’ and ‘T’;”
“So, then, our grave so great’s
From shovel small,
Worse than fate’s,
You do install,
As some sordid soothsayer,
Like some wicked word-player,
Hath your whim on us destroyed
All we loved and once enjoyed!”
“Nay, a horse hungry for hay thou art,
‘Stead given the wooden harp,
Which rhymes – you see? –
Imperfectly.”
“Yay, but from St. November –
Was he of your doing too? –
We’ve learnt what we shall all remember –
The harp did not deserve our rue;
Instead, it amplified our voice,
And always staid as better choice
Over silent begging pain,
Over tacit negging stain,
Which took only and never gave –
A bold behavior almost brave –
Allowed us give the thund’rous throng
A beauteous and wondrous song;”
“St. November is your doing;
I know not of that name –
Ah! That, too, was my ruing;
I take upon the blame –
More wordplay, I fret to say,
Though did start with thy dismay,
Which led to your mood jejune,
And then my august rune so soon,
Followed by – and this one’s limber –
The lightning strike that incept ember,
Leading to October St.,
And the harpists thou didst meet,
Right on to good St. November.”
“So… it was all for you….
You’ve ruined all that is true;”
“And created all it, too,
For, you see, I am your poet;
If you didn’t, now you know it –
I make all things from inkling seed,
So, tell me – what do you need?”
“Harps! We want our harps now back!”
“Of all the things thou does lack?”
“Yes, for we lack them the most!”
Then, as if by some figment ghost,
Harps appeared all in their arms,
Like little warding lovely charms;
“We thank you! We thank you!”
Here is what next did ensue:
The harpers returned to their places,
With the same grim on their faces,
Playing mistuned, morose sound
O’er caps in laps where found
Coinage meager, hunger full,
Thus the tale do I extol,
As the next month comes December,
Ends the year each year the same,
Does my storied rhyme so limber,
Also cease by way it came.
TERMINUS
-Poyetikos
Poyetikos 