Poetry Is Not The Thing Said, But

On Occasions, After Drinking A Pint Of Beer At Luncheon, There Would Be A Flow Into My Mind With Sudden And Unaccountable Emotion, Sometimes A Line Or Two Of Verse, Sometimes A Whole Stanza, Accompanied, Not Preceded By A Vague Notion Of The Poem Which They Were Destined To Form A Part Of.... I Say Bubble Up Because, So Far As I Could Make Out, The Source Of The Suggestions Thus Proffered To The Brain Was The Pit Of The Stomach.

Strapped, Noosed, Nighing His Hour, He Stood And Counted Them And Cursed His Luck; And Then The Clock Collected In The Tower Its Strength, And Struck.

I, A Stranger And Afraid, In A World I Never Made.

We Now To Peace And Darkness And Earth And Thee Restore Thy Creature That Thou Madest And Wilt Cast Forth No More.

If A Man Will Comprehend The Richness And Variety Of The Universe, And Inspire His Mind With A Due Measure Of Wonder And Awe, He Must Contemplate The Human Intellect Not Only On Its Heights Of Genius But In Its Abysses Of Ineptitude.