Vanitas Vanitatis after Oliver Goldsmith The Village Schoolmaster
Beside yon straggling fence that skirts the way
Rose smells as sweet without man's interplay.
Where once rose mansions, mankind skilled to rule,
passed away, as Nature thawed ice cool.
As polar bears' float floes flown extinct became,
humanity perished punished for end game
strategic errors, sunk without a trace
each day disasters throwing in their face
stupid neglect and counterfeited glee
as climate change came home with rising sea
encouraging wave whispers circling round
till last survivors, dismal tidings, drowned.
Where greed and need together feed faults caught,
no lessons learning, faulty logic fraught,
the planet's billions to their cost
too late awoke to measure all they'd lost.
Lands hands could treasure tides now hide, none guage
how storyboard saw time erase man's page
despite the skill that sapiens or wise
ten thousand years had shown in every guise.
Earthquakes off Richter Scale with thundering sound
amazed the gazing peasants ranged around;
and still cows grazed and still the wonder grew,
that Nostradamus prophecies came true.
Past is Man's fame, rot blots the very spot
where once triumphed henceforth lies forgot. Beside yon straggling fence that skirts the way
With blossom'd furze unprofitably gay,
There, in his mansion, skill'd to rule,
The village master taught his little school;
A man severe he was, and stern to view,
I knew him well, and every truant knew;
Well had the boding tremblers learn'd to trace
The days disasters in his morning face;
Full well they laugh'd with counterfeited glee,
At all his jokes, for many a joke had he:
Full well the busy whisper, circling round,
Convey'd the dismal tidings when he frown'd:
Yet he was kind; or if severe in aught,
The love he bore to learning was in fault.
The village all declar'd how much he knew;
'Twas certain he could write, and cipher too:
Lands he could measure, terms and tides presage,
And e'en the story ran that he could gauge.
In arguing too, the person own'd his skill,
For e'en though vanquish'd he could argue still;
While words of learned length and thund'ring sound
Amazed the gazing rustics rang'd around;
And still they gaz'd and still the wonder grew,
That one small head could carry all he knew.
But past is all his fame. The very spot
Where many a time he triumph'd is forgot.