A Further View
There is no giggling in this classroom,
Whispering, shuffling of books and papers, I'm
Alone at my desk in front of empty chairs
Where I have been for almost thirty years,
Though there were times I thought a class attended.
Now, thinking back, I know better, having amended
The earlier, more charitable view:
I know it was myself I talked to.
Now this is very strange, for my discourse
Is salted with little jokes (quite mild, of course,)
and simple illustrations (all concrete)
As though a wafted snore from a back seat
Had warned me people here with grades to get
Must stay awake for twenty minutes yet.
And so I have arrived by fits and starts
At a philosophy of style – of sorts.
It adds to this: But never, never
Say simply what you really feel; be clever:
Use indirection and make crystal clear
What you don't mean to people who aren't there.
To the Young Rebels
What the heart wants comes true.
Therefore be sure you
Do what you want. Look how many
Condescend to war's felicity. Stare
Where you will, you will discover no
Alternative hid from the trilobite;
History is adamant: you
Are what it willed to do.
Oh wonderful consensus! Schrecklichkeit
Falls from the air. Certainly
Men of low degree are vanity
And men of high a lie. So now
When all men know
That Gabriel has a horn
Able to blow
Rebellion and the Establishment alike
To the ionosphere, now, if you know
What you want, do, do, do, do, do.
