Mirror, Mirror, tell me,
Am I pretty or plain?
Or am I downright ugly
And ugly to remain?
Shall I marry a gentleman?
Shall I marry a clown?
Or shall I marry Old Knives-and-Scissors
Shouting through the town?
WHAT DID I DREAM?
What did I dream? I do not know.
The fragments fly like chaff.
Yet, strange, my mind was tickled so
I cannot help but laugh.
Pull the curtains close again,
Tuck my blanket in;
Must a glorious humour wane
Because birds begin
Discoursing in a restless tone,
Rousing me from sleep—
The finest entertainment known,
And given rag-cheap?
INTERLUDE: ON PRESERVING A POETICAL FORMULA
(I)
“There’s less and less cohesion
In each collection
Of my published poetries?”
You are taking me to task?
And “What were my last Royalties?
Reckoned in pounds, were they, or shillings,
Or even perhaps in pence?”
No, do not ask!
I’m lost, in buyings and sellings.
But please permit only once more for luck
Irreconcilabilities in my book....
For these are all the same stuff really,
The obverse and reverse, if you look closely,
Of busy Imagination’s new-coined money;
And if you watch the blind
Phototropisms of my fluttering mind,
Whether, growing strong, I wrestle Jacob-wise
With fiendish darkness blinking threatfully
Its bale-fire eyes,
Or whether childishly