| |
From “Whimseys”
ONCE, in the city of Kalamazoo, | |
| The gods went walking, two and two, | |
| With the friendly phoenix, the stars of Orion, | |
| The speaking pony and singing lion. | |
| For in Kalamazoo in a cottage apart | 5 |
| Lived the girl with the innocent heart. | |
| |
| Thenceforth the city of Kalamazoo | |
| Was the envied, intimate chum of the sun. | |
| He rose from a cave by the principal street. | |
| The lions sang, the dawn-horns blew, | 10 |
| And the ponies danced on silver feet. | |
| He hurled his clouds of love around; | |
| Deathless colors of his old heart | |
| Draped the houses and dyed the ground. | |
| O shrine of the wide young Yankee land, | 15 |
| Incense city of Kalamazoo, | |
| That held, in the midnight, the priceless sun | |
| As a jeweller holds an opal in hand! | |
| |
| From the awkward city of Oshkosh came | |
| Love the bully no whip shall tame, | 20 |
| Bringing his gang of sinners bold. | |
| And I was the least of his Oshkosh men; | |
| But none were reticent, none were old. | |
| And we joined the singing phoenix then, | |
| And shook the lilies of Kalamazoo | 25 |
| All for one hidden butterfly. | |
| Bulls of glory, in cars of war | |
| We charged the boulevards, proud to die | |
| For her ribbon sailing there on high. | |
| Our blood set gutters all aflame, | 30 |
| Where the sun slept without any heat— | |
| Cold rock till he must rise again. | |
| She made great poets of wolf-eyed men— | |
| The dear queen-bee of Kalamazoo, | |
| With her crystal wings, and her honey heart. | 35 |
| We fought for her favors a year and a day | |
| (Oh, the bones of the dead, the Oshkosh dead, | |
| That were scattered along her pathway red!) | |
| And then, in her harum-scarum way, | |
| She left with a passing traveller-man— | 40 |
| With a singing Irishman | |
| Went to Japan. | |
| |
| Why do the lean hyenas glare | |
| Where the glory of Artemis had begun— | |
| Of Atalanta, Joan of Arc, | 45 |
| Cinderella, Becky Thatcher, | |
| And Orphant Annie, all in one? | |
| Who burned this city of Kalamazoo | |
| Till nothing was left but a ribbon or two— | |
| One scorched phoenix that mourned in the dew, | 50 |
| Acres of ashes, a junk-man’s cart, | |
| A torn-up letter, a dancing shoe, | |
| (And the bones of the dead, the dead)? | |
| Who burned this city of Kalamazoo— | |
| Love-town, Troy-town Kalamazoo? | 55 |
| |
| A harum-scarum innocent heart. | |
| |
