Nothing much happened today1, so I thought I’d recite a poem for you. I’m doing this from memory, so I apologize if I got any of the words wrong.
The Village Dummy — Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Under a spreading wingnut-tree
The village dummy stands;
The Don, a flighty man is he,
With small and tiny hands;
And the muscles of his scrawny arms
Are weak as tissue strands.
His hair is lank, and weird, and long,
His face is sickly tan;
His brow is wet with fearful sweat,
He steals whate'er he can,
And looks the whole world in the face,
For he lies to every man.
Week in, week out, from morn till night,
You can see his twitters flow;
You can hear him spout his heavy sludge,
With frenzied bleat and low2,
He’s a cad molesting the village belle,
With the evening still aglow.
And children coming home from school
Peak in at the open door;
They hate to see the fool engorge,
And fear the bully’s roar,
And catch the running kids that fly
Like sheep fleeing the killing-floor.
He goes on Sunday to the church,
Alone beside his bullyboys;
He hears the parson bray and screech,
He hears his master's voice,
Putin’s in the village choir,
And it eats his soul like lice.
It sounds to him like his father's voice,
Bursting forth to criticize!
He needs must think of him once more,
How in the grave he lies;
And with his soft, small hand he wipes
A tear out of his eyes.
Spoiling,--reviling,--demeaning,
Onward through life he goes;
Each morning sees some tweet begin,
Each evening sees it close
Nothing attempted, nothing done,
Showing cause to diagnose.
Thanks, thanks to thee, my sleazy foe,
For the lesson thou hast taught!
Thus at the flaming fount of lies
Our fortunes must be wrought;
Thus from your craven empty mind
Each evil deed and thought.
(from Ballads and Other Poems — 1842)
1Ok, Mittens did vote to convict, so I guess that counts as something.
2low — to utter the deep, low sound characteristic of cattle; moo.
karij carried the GNR torch this morning: Wednesday Good News Roundup, Trust the Blue, Nothing Else will do
Mokurai’s diary today is about how to write diaries. It’s a useful guide for new authors: Renewable Wednesday: Green Diary Howto I