All through the land of Gul, the stout
Young Spring is kicking Winter out.
The grass sneaks in upon the scene,
Defacing it with bottle-green.
The stumbling lamb arrives to ply
His restless tail in every eye,
Eats nasty mint to spoil his meat
And make himself unfit to eat.
Madly his throat the bulbul tears—
In every grove blasphemes and swears
As the immodest rose displays
Her shameless charms a dozen ways.
Lo! now, throughout the utmost span
Of Ispahan—of Gulistan—
A big new book’s displayed in all
The shops and cumbers every stall.
The price is low—the dealers
say ’tis—
And the rich are treated to it gratis.
Engraven on its foremost page
These title-words the eye engage:
“The Life of Muley Ben Maroon,
Of Astrabad—Rogue, Thief, Buffoon
And Miser—Liver by the Sweat
Of Better Men: A Lamponette
Composed in Rhyme and Written all
By Meerza Solyman Zingall!”
CORRECTED NEWS.
’T was a maiden lady (the newspapers
say)
Pious and prim and a bit gone-gray.
She slept like an angel, holy
and white,
Till ten o’ the clock
in the shank o’ the night
(When men and other wild animals prey)
And then she cried in the viewless gloom:
“There’s a man in the room,
a man in the room!”
And this maiden lady (they make it appear)
Leapt out of the window, five fathom sheer!
Alas, that lying is such a sin
When newspaper men need bread and gin
And none can be had for less
than a lie!
For the maiden lady a bit gone-gray
Saw the man in the room from across the
way,
And leapt, not out of the window but in—
Ten fathom sheer, as
I hope to die!
AN EXPLANATION.
“I never yet exactly could determine
Just how it is that the judicial ermine
Is kept so safely from predacious vermin.”
“It is not so, my friend: though
in a garret
’Tis kept in camphor, and you often
air it,
The vermin will get into it and wear it.”
JUSTICE.
Jack Doe met Dick Roe, whose wife he loved,
And said: “I will
get the best of him.”
So pulling a knife from his boot, he shoved
It up to the hilt in the breast
of him.
Then he moved that weapon forth and back,
Enlarging the hole he had
made with it,
Till the smoking liver fell out, and Jack
Merrily, merrily played with
it.
Then he reached within and he seized the
slack
Of the lesser bowel, and,
traveling
Hither and thither, looked idly back
On that small intestine, raveling.
The wretched Richard, with many a grin
Laid on with exceeding suavity,
Curled up and died, and they ran John
in
And charged him with sins
of gravity.