Strange Jokes
Well: Death is a huge omnivorous Toad Grim squatting on a twilight road. He catcheth all that Circumstance Hath tossed to him. He curseth all who upward glance As lost to him. Once in a whimsey mood he sat And talked of life, in proverbs pat, To Eve in Eden, -- ”Death, on Life” -- As if he knew! And so he toadied Adam’s wife There, in the dew. O dainty dew, O morning dew That gleamed in the world’s first dawn, did you And the sweet grass and manful oaks Give lair and rest To him who toadwise sits and croaks His death-behest? Who fears the hungry Toad? Not I! He but unfetters me to fly. The German still, when one is dead, Cries out ”Der Tod!” But, pilgrims, Christ will walk ahead And clear the road.
Sidney Lanier’s other poems:
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