ON
THE FIRST PAGE OF AN ALBUM BELONGING
TO HIS FRIEND, AUGUSTE BRESSIER.
In this album, bright and blank,
You give the first page up to me;
I accept the solemn rank.
Why not? The drum and fife, I see,
March 'fore the colonel everywhere;
Choir-boys and beadles on the ways,
Precede the priests with hoary hair;
Cheap wines are served on gala-days
Before the costly wines of Spain;
Guests drink, nor of the rule complain;
And all museums take good care
In entrance vestibules to place
The daubs that give us stare for stare,
While halls far in the Raphaels grace.
Isn't this the law of Holy Writ,
The first as last must choose to sit?
When worlds were made from unshaped clay,
Was not this order followed too?
Who runs may read, is all I say:
First minerals of every hue,
Then flowers, the mirrors of the sun,
Then animals that have no soul,
