Стихи и эссе

The soldier loves his rifle,
   The scholar loves his books,
The farmer loves his horses,
   The film star loves her looks.
There's love the whole world over
   Wherever you may be;
Some lose their rest for gay Mae West,
   But you're my cup of tea.

Some talk of Alexander

   And some of Fred Astaire,
Some like their heroes hairy
   Some like them debonair,
Some prefer a curate
   And some an A.D.C.,
Some like a tough to treat'em rough,
   But you're my cup of tea.

Some are mad on Airedales

   And some on Pekinese,
On tabby cats or parrots
   Or guinea pigs or geese.
There are patients in asylums
   Who think that they're a tree;
I had an ant who loved a plant,
   But you're my cup of tea.

Some have sagging waistlines

  And some a bulbous nose
And some a floating kidney
   And some have hammer toes,
Some have tennis elbow
   And some have housemaid's knee,
And some I know have got B.O.,
   But you're my cup of tea.

The blackbird loves the earthworm,

   The adder loves the sun,
The polar bear an iceberg,
  The elephant a bun,
The trout enjoys the river,
  The whale enjoys the sea,
And dogs love most an old lamp-post,
   But you're my cup of tea.

Musee des Beaux Arts

About suffering they were never wrong,
The Old Masters: how well they understood
Its human position; how it takes place
While someone else is eatting or opening a window
                       or just walking dully along;
How, when the aged are reverently, passionately waiting
For the miraculous birth, there always must be
Children who did not specially want it to happen, skating
On the pond at the edge of the wood:

They never forgot

That even the dreadful martydrom must run its course
Anyhow in a corner, some untidy spot
Where the dogs go on with their doggy life and the torturer's horse
Scratches its innocent behind in a tree.

In Brueghel's Icarus, for instance: how everything turns away

Quite leisurely from the disaster; the ploughman may
Have heard the splash, the forsaken cry,
But for him it was not an important failure; the sun shone
As it had to on the white legs disappearing into the green
Water; and the expensive delicate ship that must have seen
Something amazing, a boy falling out of the sky,
Somewhere to get to and sailed calmly on.

Who is Who?