In Memoriam: William Topaz McGonagall

I very nearly missed this anniversary--it being September 29, 1902, that this noted poet had gone to earth and sung his last--so I'm a little off, but then, aren't we occasionally all? To belatedly mark this occasion, I made a piece of verse as I thought would be a fit memorial, and potentially edifying, if I may say so:

ODE on Another Ink-Stained Wretch (Alas, E'er such as I!)


It is but a hundred and five years, and one day,
Since the passing of the poet of the silvery Tay,
Whose verse, 'twas said, would make all merry,
for at being bad, 'twas extraordinary.

But think not that those lines for posterity,
written in a drink-free austerity,
were composed to satisfy th' aethetic sense
of dullards with art's true "connaisance",

For here was the poet smitten sore by the muse,
that eschewed airs as well as booze,
unlike many another we could name.
And a century or so later: here's his fame:

(many another poet could have done the same--
and lived out a longer, more temperate day,
singing, if they would, a more sober lay.)


But fame is jealous, and is fickle.
Of verses, he had made his mickle,
but the most fame was from the bridge of the Tay--
which befell a disaster, sad to say.

Whether through the lack of reckoning of men,
whose lack of buttresses lacked acumen,
or through the jealousy of the muses,
who, what men build up--they confuses--

Indignant at the feat of both the rail,
and of the poet whom we now hail,
Did bid the mighty winds to blow--
Down went the bridge, as all should know.

But acting as Heaven's Own amenuesis,
he birthed the disaster's apothoesis--
enscribing the terror with his pen
'Pon the hearts and minds of all good men--

And wonder at this--ye should well ken,
In verse did build it up again.
Perhaps in this story--his relation of the bridge,
to which that of Brooklyn were a "midge"

We should find here an allegory,
more than a mere disaster story--
think you upon this poet long,
as I wind up the drift of my song:

Hark on this: as flows the silver Tay,
so flows the lines of that wretched lay
--and more than this--many another,
each to each so like could be a brother,

Yet all immortal, the poet no more slighted,
than by disaster was the rail quite blighted.
That this the Muses' toy wore no laurel,
And yet with life he had little quarrel.

And in the end the scythe of death doth sway--
taking poets both the good and bad away.
As was Shakepeare's existence rounded with a sleep--
or noble Shelley's sunk in the deep--

Or whatever you make of Coleridge's--
McGonagall et al shall outlast bridges,
And tho' their names, vide Keats were writ in water-
For all those after, are they fodder--

In the mouths of readers--(and worms,
Not to be rude!)
To be slowly digested
As they are chewed.


There. Hopefully fitting.