The Idiot at Home Page 8

  VII

  HOUSEHOLD POETRY

  "Yes," said the Idiot, in response to an inquiry from the Poet, who waspassing a Sunday with him at Castle Idiot, "I have found that there is agreat deal of poetry in the apparently uninspiring little things of ahousehold. There is to me as much poetry in a poker as there is in asnow-clad Alp, if you only have an eye to find it; and I am sure that tothousands of housewives the whole land over a sonnet to a clothes-pin,written by one who knows the clothes-pin's nature intimately, would befar more appealing than a similar number of lines trying to prove thatwe are all miserable phantoms flitting across a morass of woe."

  The Poet pulled away thoughtfully at his pipe. He was a broad-mindedpoet, and while he had never owned a poker of his own, he was ready toadmit its possibilities; but he could not follow his friend closelyenough to admit that it contained as much that was inspiring as did MontBlanc, for instance, a bright particular Alp of which he was very fond.

  The Idiot continued:

  "'THE JOYS AND WOES OF THE TOILERS WHO MINED IT'"]

  "A ton of coal contains far more warmth than a woman's eyebrow; sendsthe mind of a thoughtful person chasing backward to the time when it laysnugly hid in the fair breast of nature; to the joys and woes of thetoilers who mined it; through a variety of complexities of life, everyone of them fraught with noble thoughts. Yet who ever wrote daintyverses to a ton of coal, and who hasn't at one time or another in hislife written about the eyebrows of some woman?"

  The Poet laughed this time. "A triolet to a ton of coal would be aglorious thing now, wouldn't it?" he observed.

  "No," said the Idiot. "A triolet could never be a glorious thing underany circumstances; but to the extent that a ton of coal contains acertain amount of grandeur in the service it renders to mankind, I thinkthe form would be ennobled somewhat by the substance. Let's try it andsee."

  "You do it," said the Poet; "I really don't think I could do thesubject justice."

  The Idiot got out a pencil and a pad of paper and began.

  "I don't think I'll make it a triolet," he said, after biting the end ofhis pencil for a few moments. "A whole ton is a good deal to cram into atriolet. I'll just make it a plain poem of the go-as-you-please varietyinstead, eh?"

  "In the manner of Whitman, perhaps?" suggested the Poet, dryly.

  "Just so," said the Idiot. "In the manner of Whitman; in fact, I thinkthe manner of Whitman is the only manner for the poetic description of aton of coal."

  He began to scribble on the pad.

  "I'm going to call this 'Content,'" he said in a few moments."Contentment strikes me as the main lesson a ton of coal teaches."

  He scribbled on, and in four or five minutes he put down his pencil andread the following lines:

  "I'm glad I'm not as men are-- Always worrying about something, and often about nothing; About what was and what wasn't; Fretting about what may be and what might have been; Wondering whether when they are called upon to do their duty They'll be able to do it, And generally deciding they won't, To their own discomfort. And if so be they're women, Cogitating from morn till night, From night till morn, Wherewithal shall they be clothed, And if their hats are on straight! Yea! I am glad I am not like one of these, But am myself-- A ton of coal--jetty in my blackness and luminous in my bituminosity. Lying here in the cellar content and not bothering a bit. Not needing income or clothes, and wearing no hat, and with no complexion to bother about. Happy and serene about my duty, Certain that I shall succeed when the time for action comes; Knowing that I shall burn, And in the burning glow like the polar star. Cackling and crackling, Hissing and smoking, Full of heat, A satisfaction to mankind, And never worth less than $5.65, delivered! Ah, me! What bliss to be a ton of coal! I am content."

  The Poet nodded his pleasure at the effort. "It is charmingly put," hesaid. "I must confess, my dear Idiot, that the idea of contentment isthe last one that I should ever have extracted from contemplation ofa binful of anthracite, and yet when I consider how you put it I wonderit has not occurred to every one. You have the manner of the Whitmanparodist down fine, too."

  "Thank you," said the Idiot. "It is entirely natural to me. I think,too, that using the Whitman lack of form carries with it the notion ofthe coal sliding down the chute, don't you? Coal runs into the cellar insuch an irresponsible, formless way, eh?"

  "Precisely," smiled the Poet. "You have the right notion about that. Theform of a poem should really be adapted to the substance. It should bedescriptive, always. Tennyson's 'Charge of the Light Brigade' has in itsrhythm nothing more or less than the clatter of the horses' hoofs asthey and their riders dashed through the valley of death at Balaklava.And how vividly Southey's brook comes before the mind in its mad rushdownward as one reads that wonderfully lyrical poem. Why don't you writea book of household poetry? You seem to me to be eminently wellqualified to undertake it."

  "I intend to," said the Idiot. "In fact, I've begun it already. Writtenfive or six. Like to see 'em?"

  "Indeed I should," said the Poet. "Anything you do interests me."

  The Idiot went to his desk and took from it a few pages of manuscript.

  "Here is a thing on pokers I did the other night. I called it 'The Songof the Poker Bold.'" And then he read these lines:

  "Warder of the grate am I, Ever standing near; Poking, poking all day long, Knowing naught of fear.

  "Keeping coals up to their work, Setting them aglow, Minding not the scorching heat, Rather like it so.

  "Knocking ashes right and left, Flirting with the tiles; Bossing tongs and seeing that The brazen kettle biles.

  "And the little girls and boys As they watch me pause, Wishing that I'd talk and tell 'Bout old Santa Claus!

  "Cracking jokes with crickets on The merry hearth, elate; Happy lot indeed is mine-- Warder of the grate!"

  "Splendid!" cried the Poet, clapping his hands with enthusiasm."Splendid! A good stiff pokeresque lyric, and your characterization ofthe poker as the 'Warder of the Grate' gives it a flavor of romance. Youcould almost imagine the implement going out into a mediaeval world insearch of knightly adventure--a sort of hearth-stone Quixote. Have youtackled the clothes-pin yet?"

  "Yes," replied the Idiot. "Indeed, my first effort was a lyric on theclothes-pin. I started one night to do the contents of thekitchen-dresser drawer in French forms, but the first thing I took outwas an egg-beater, and it wouldn't go, so I did the clothes-pin lyric. Icall it

  "FIDELITY

  "Blow, ye winds, I fear ye not; Blast, ye simoon, Sere and hot!

  "Hurricane, And cyclone, too, Blow, I have no Fear of you.

  "Lacking beauty, Lacking grace, Lacking handsome Form and face;

  "Lacking soul And intellect, Still I stand up, Proud, erect.

  "For the Fates Have given me Wondrous great Tenacity.

  "And success, Both fair and fine, Comes to him Who holds his line.

  "Burrs can stick And so can glue-- Mucilage, Stratena, too;

  "But there's nothing Holds so fast As the clothes-pin To the last."

  "And you gave up the egg-beater altogether?" asked the Poet, restraininga natural inclination to find flaws in the construction of theclothes-pin poem.

  "Oh no," said the Idiot, "I knocked off a little quatrain on that. Icalled it 'The Speedy Egg-Beater,' and it goes like this:

  "Great Maude S. can beat all steeds, However speedy be their legs; But I distance her with ease When it comes to beating eggs."

  "I really think that you would have done better to give up theegg-beater," said the Poet, grown critical. "I've no patience withone-rhymed quatrains. Now if you had written:

  "Great Maude S. can beat all steeds, However speedy be their legs; But despite her doughty deeds; I can beat her beating eggs,

  "I should not have objected."

  "I accept the amendment," replied the Idiot
, meekly. "I realized theweakness of the thing myself, and thought of changing it into a couplet,where you only need one rhyme. How's this on a 'Carpet-Tack'?"

  "'FOR THOUGH I'M BUT A CARPET-TACK

  AFAR FROM MOIL AND STRIFE,

  NO ONE CAN EVER TRULY SAY

  THAT MINE'S A POINTLESS LIFE'"]

  "However dull the day, However dull the skies, However dark the night may be, My spirits ever rise.

  "For though I'm but a carpet-tack, Afar from moil and strife, No one can ever truly say That mine's a pointless life."

  "That is very good," said the Poet. "I think almost any editor of anycomic paper would be willing to pay you three dollars for that. It is asgood as your poem on a ton of coal--simple in its expression and sweetin sentiment."

  "I thought you'd think so," said the Idiot. "It struck me so. I've gotone on a screw-driver, too, that is very much of the same order, andconveys a moral lesson to the reader who is always reaching out afterthe unattainable. It reads as follows:

  "I cannot tool a tally-ho, I cannot drive a nag; I dare not hold the ribbons On a hack or rumbling drag.

  "I could not guide the reins upon A simple billy-goat, And I should hesitate to try To drive a can-al boat.

  "But I don't mind these things at all, For I can drive a screw, And I am happy, for that's just What I was meant to do."

  "'I SHOULD HESITATE TO TRY TO WRITE A CAN-AL BOAT'"]

  "The fourth line of the second verse is weak, but otherwise it's good,"commented the Poet. "It's not a _can_-al boat; it's a can-_al_ boat, andall the poetic license in the world wouldn't excuse your taking sucha liberty with language."

  "I appreciate that," said the Idiot. "But I don't see how I could getaround it."

  "There's only one way," said the Poet. "I think if you omitted thatverse altogether you'd improve the poem."

  "Then I should have to eliminate the billy-goat," said the Idiot. "Thattakes a great deal of humor out of it. I always laugh when I encounter abeast like that in poetry; he seems so helpless when incarcerated in apoem."

  "That may be," observed the Poet. "But it is my belief that the goat, ofall animals in the kingdom, was the last one designed to be used inpoetry, anyhow. He is bad enough in prose, and in this case will buttyour poem to oblivion if you insist on keeping him in it. Any more?"

  "No," said the Idiot; "that's the last."

  "Well, you've got a good start," said the Poet, rising to light hispipe, which had gone out. "And if I were you I'd go on and finish thebook. 'The Idiot's Book of Household Poetry' would have a great sale.It has but one drawback that I can see. You harp on one string too much.Every one of your poems preaches contentment, satisfaction--nothingelse."

  "That," said the Idiot, "is not an objection, but a virtue; for whatother lesson," he added, with a glance of pride at his surroundings,"what other lesson, my dear Poet, should a home try to teach, and whatother sentiment can mean so much to mankind?"

  "'I HAVEN'T EVER HAD A HOME; I'VE ALWAYS BOARDED'"]

  "I don't know," said the Poet, with a little sigh. "I haven't ever had ahome; I've always boarded."

  Whereupon the Idiot rose up from his chair, and putting his arm abouthis friend's shoulder, said:

  "How you do talk! Never had a home? Why, my dear fellow, what's this?It's yours as long as it's mine!"