I
Turned from the “eau-forte
Par Jaquemart”
To the strait head
Of Messalina:
“His True Penelope
Was Flaubert,”
And his tool
The engraver's.
Firmness,
Not the full smile,
His art, but an art
In profile;
Colourless
Pier Francesca,
Pisanello lacking the skill
To forge Achaia.
II
E. P. ODE POUR L’ ÉLECTION DE SON SÉPULCHRE
For three years, out of key with his time,
He strove to resuscitate the dead art
Of poetry; to maintain “the sublime”
In the old sense. Wrong from the start —
No, hardly, but, seeing he had been born
In a half savage country, out of date;
Bent resolutely on wringing lilies from the acorn;
Capaneus; trout for factitious bait:
“Idmen gar toi panth, os eni Troie
Caught in the unstopped ear;
Giving the rocks small lee-way
The chopped seas held him, therefore, that year.
