Sagesse

WHAT SAYST THOU, TRAVELLER, OF ALL THOU SAW'ST AFAR?

What sayst thou, traveller, of all thou saw'st afar?
On every tree hangs boredom, ripening to its fall,
Didst gather it, thou smoking yon thy sad cigar,
Black, casting an incongruous shadow on the wall?

Thine eyes are just as dead as ever they have been,
Unchanged is thy grimace, thy dolefulness is one,
Thou mind'st one of the wan moon through the rigging seen,
The wrinkled sea beneath the golden morning sun,

The ancient graveyard with new gravestones every day,--
But, come, regale us with appropriate detail,
Those disillusions weeping at the fountains, say,
Those new disgusts, just like their brothers, littered stale,

Those women! Say the glare, the identical dismay
Of ugliness and evil, always, in all lands,
And say Love, too,--and Politics, moreover, say,
With ink-dishonored blood upon their shameless hands.

And then, above all else, neglect not to recite
Thy proper feats, thou dragging thy simplicity
Wherever people love, wherever people fight,
In such a sad and foolish kind, in verity!

Has that dull innocence been punished as it should?