Cat-houses talk cold turkey to my guards;
But I found true-love stitching outing-shirts
In the black forest of the colored wards-–
Lieutenants squawked like chickens in her
skirts.
You are my true-love, though your talk went wrong.
Thus we are married, child; and when I drew
You underneath my overturned canoe,
I hugged you to my heart where toys belong.
Six times I knew you-like a trolley-pole
Sparking at contact, your electric shock-,
The power-house! ... The sergeant calls our roll.
He counts the spoons. We file before the clock,
And fancy minnows, slaves of habit, shoot
Like starlight through their air-conditioned bowl.
It's time for feeding. Each subnormal boot–
Black heart is pulsing to its ant-egg dole.
Francis Fergusson
AESOP IN HELL: THE FOX AND THE CROW
In the dead-still November woods, a flutter
in the dry thicket of scrub-oak, betrays
the crow and
his
heavy cheese, in harsh struggle,
To reynard-fox's steady, agate gaze.
The crow's thin claws slip on the branch that swings
and dips, forward and back: how can he raise
The prize, on his weak neck and trembling wings?
And like unseen, revealing verity,
the very visage of unwelcome things,
See now the witness of indignity
glide from behind a bush on noiseless paws,
with face of ambivalent sympathy.
The crow regains his poise, clenching his claws
and beak, but his quick breath comes sharp and dry
as the fox holds a tense and lengthy pause.
