Wine, Water, and Song

by G. K. Chesterton

Which might have had a more marked effect,

And pleased the pride of a weaker man that yearned for wine or wife;

But Fame and the Flagon, for Mr. Mandragon

—obscured the Simple Life.

Mr. Mandragon, the Millionaire, I am happy to say, is dead;

He enjoyed a quiet funeral in a Crematorium shed.

And he lies there fluffy and soft and grey and certainly quite refined;

When he might have rotted to flowers and fruit with Adam and all mankind,

Or been eaten by wolves athirst for blood,