He's dignity itself, and proper pride,
That stands serenely in a circus-world
Of mountebanks and monkeys. He has weight
Behind him: aeons of primeval power
Have shaped that pillared bulk; and he stands sure,
Solid, substantial on the world's foundations.
And he has form, form that's too big a thing
To be called beauty. Once, long since, I thought
To be a poet, and shape words, and mould
A poem like an elephant, huge, sublime,
To front oblivion; and because I failed,
And all my rhymes were gawky, shambling camels,
Or else obscene, blue-buttocked apes, I'm doomed
To lackey it for things such as I've made,
Till one of them crunches my backbone with his teeth,
Or knocks my wind out with a forthright kick
Clean in the midriff, crumpling up in death
The hunched and stunted body that was me--
John, the apostle of the Perfect Form!
Jerusalem! I'm talking like a book--
As you would say: and a bad book at that,
A maundering, kiss-mammy book--The Hunch-back's End
Or The Camel-Keeper's Reward--would be its title.
I froth and bubble like a new-broached cask.
No wonder you look glum, for all your grin.
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