CHICAGO MAY
If had twopence, you should have it, sure;
And I would flee, on hygienic grounds,
But as things are, I am extremely poor;
T owe a matter of five thousand pounds;
‘And as I have a girl to help, here goes!
I cannot both help her, and help my nose.
God ! God! God! God! is there no scavenger
To cart this nastiness? Or can there be
No sewer fit to suck the corpse of her
Into the great, all-purifying sea?
Her little hand would rather, I opine,
The multitudinous seas incacadine!
xv
If men could hear me, they would smile and say :
How this young satirist exaggerates!
If they could see me, they would all go gray
‘With horror, know there is no word in hate’s
Roll to speak hate, just as in all love's lore
There is no word for love—oh, snore, sow, snore!
1 am rigid with my hate; the brain stands still,
Frozen in hate, the eyes one frightful glare.
‘Oh, may sleep save me—or the twitch and thrill
Of ecstasy—and yet I hardly dare.
Anything but to wake (dear God, I pray!)
To the mad maulings of Chicago May.