wb :

Russet leaves and sunset eaves
Calm the heart and quake the knees
Like some melodious disease.

Always the first iniquities
Are the sovereign bonds and the equities
That titillate the intellect
With just enough of fict and fact,
A mediocre tease.

And then, with promises of ease,
The deeds and debts to properties
That one half-willingly contracts
And half as willingly forgets
Upon the payment of the broker's fees,

And the termination of the lease.

---

The spilling amber paints its ease
Upon the cracked mahoganies.
First your hands, and then your eyes,
And then your mind will tell you lies,
Even your gilded vanities.

And with their careless vagaries,
Years on years in every crease.
Clouded eyes and candleglare
Trace each callus, trace each care
Measuring your disabilities.

When did you turn your faculties
To petty things as these?

---

Beside the bottles and the lawyer's sheaves,
Familiar faces, faded memories:
The hanged man, Justice, Temperance,
The hierophant, the empress,
And the lovers- now the divorcees.

Tender laughter, ever may it tease
Your pains away.
Let it linger, let it stay
With the comfort that it guarantees.

Still- wherefore, whence, and whither these
Pangs and pains, o these regrets,
With your philosopher's degrees?

---

Rugged hands that wait on ragged knees
Warm themselves upon the sunset leaves.
Moving with their careless vagaries,
Years on years in every wrinkled crease
As they trace the cracked mahoganies.

Beside the bottles and the lawyer's sheaves,
All I have left are faded memories
And half-forgot philosopher's degrees,
The measure of my disabilities.

Just ask the lovers, now the divorcees-
Only comfort has its guarantees,
And those are merely gilded vanities.

Always like some melodious disease,
Tender laughter- ever may it tease.