"What is our expiation,
For what primeval crime,
That we must go on marching
Until the crash of time?
"What hand has shaped so cruelly?
What whim has cast such fate?
Where is, in our creation,
The botch that makes us great?"
"Oh, that's good, darling! That's very good. I'm proud of you, David."
"I think it stinks," he said evenly, "but, anyway, there are two more verses."
"David!"
Grimly, he spat out the last eight lines.
"Why are we ever gimleted
By empire's irony?
Is discontent the cancered price
Of Earthman's galaxy?"
Leonora, recoiling from his cold fury, was a shaking pair of shoulders and a mass of lank hair supported by her hands on her face while she sobbed.
"Are our souls so much perverted?
Can we not relent?
Or are the stars the madman's cost
For his inborn discontent?
"Good night, Leonora."