I VIEWED him well, the visible fat fool, <br />And yet I took him in; for I contended, <br />Friends are not sent in order of our choosing, <br />They come unsuited like the gifts of God. <br />I would not do a perfidy to friendship, <br />I let him past the private inner gate <br />And made him be at home among my treasures <br />Like my true friend. <br /> <br /> <br />Now I am ground with a grim torture daily <br />That I have been befriended by a fool. <br />He forages at will upon my garden, <br />He noses all its pretty secrets out, <br />And still the fool finds nothing to his liking. <br />Meeting a modest velveteen affair, <br />Peevish he hangs his sad and silly head: <br />'Alas! such unsubstantial gaudy goods!' <br />Thus he meets pansies; meeting zinnias, <br />He nearly faints at such a rioting: <br />'Alas! what fruit will these red wantons bear?' <br /> <br /> <br />And not a perfume spills upon the air <br />But his malicious nose suspects a poison, <br />As he goes browsing like an ancient ass, <br />An old distempered ass. <br /> <br /> <br />I'd almost rather be a friendless man <br />And have my house my own. The prying fool <br />Asks me the queerest idiotic questions: <br />'O friend, is this the harvest of your hands? <br />How will you stand before the lord of harvests? <br />These are the gardens of your idleness; <br />Where is the vineyard, friend?'<br /><br />John Crowe Ransom<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/friendship-294/
