LO, upon the carpet, where <br /> Throned upon a heap of slain <br />Blue-eyed dolls of beauty rare <br /> (Ah, they pleaded all in vain!) <br /> Sits the Infant Tamerlane! <br />Broken toys upon the floor <br /> Scattered lie—a ruined rout. <br />Thus from all things evermore <br /> Are—the fact is past a doubt— <br /> Hidden virtues hammered out. <br /> <br />Poet’s page, or statesman’s bust, <br /> Nothing comes to him amiss; <br />Everything he clutches must— <br /> ’Tis his simple dream of bliss!— <br /> Suffer his analysis. <br /> <br />O my little Tamerlane, <br /> Infantile Iconoclast, <br />Is your small barbaric brain <br /> Not o’erawed by the amassed <br /> Wit and Wisdom of the Past? <br /> <br />Type are you of that which springs <br /> Ever forth when comes the need, <br />Overthrowing thrones and kings, <br /> Faithless altar, sapless creed; <br /> Sowing fresh and living seed. <br /> <br />On the worn-out Roman realm, <br /> In whose purple gnawed the moth, <br />Thus its pride to overwhelm, <br /> And its state to carve like cloth, <br /> Swept the fierce, long-sworded Goth. <br /> <br />Age preserves with doting care <br /> Things from which life long has fled, <br />Shrieks to see Youth touch a hair <br /> On the mouldiest mummy-head— <br /> So Egyptians kept their dead. <br /> <br />Youth comes by with head high-reared, <br /> Stares in scorn at these august <br />Effigies by age revered— <br /> Gilded shapes of Greed and Lust— <br /> Shakes them into rags and dust. <br /> <br />Little Vandal, smash away! <br /> Riot while your blood is hot!— <br />If into the world each day <br /> Such as you are entered not, <br /> It would perish of dry-rot.<br /><br />Victor James Daley<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/tamerlane-2/
