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Title: Bookworm Ballads - A Literary Feast
Author: John Kendrick Bangs [
More Titles by Bangs]
MY Bookworm gave a dinner to a number of his set.
I was not there-I say it to my very great regret.
For they dined well, I fancy, if the menu that I saw
Was followed as implicitly as one obeys the law.
"’Twill open," he observed to me, "with quatrains on the half.
They go down easy; then for soup"-it really made me laugh-
"The poems of old Johnny Gay"-his words were rather rough-
"They’ll do quite well, for, after all, soup’s thin and sloppy stuff.
"For fish, old Izaak Walton; and to serve as an _entrée_,
I think some fixed-up morsel, say from James, or from Daudet;
The roast will be Charles Kingsley-there’s a deal of beef in him.
For sherbet, T. B. Aldrich is just suited to my whim.
"For game I’ll have Boccaccio-he’s quite the proper one;
He certainly is gamey, and a trifle underdone;
And for the salad, Addison, so fresh and crisp is he,
With just a touch of Pope to give a tang to him, you see.
"And then for cheese, Max Nordau, for I think you’ll find right there
Some things as strong and mushy as the best of Camembert;
And for dessert let Thackeray and O. Khayyám be brought,
The which completes a dinner of most wondrous richness fraught.
"For olives and for almonds we can take the jokes of _Punch_-
They’re good enough for us, I think, to casually munch;
And through it all we’ll quaff the wines that flow forever clear
From Avon’s vineyards in the heart of Will of Warwickshire."
[The end]
John Kendrick Bangs's poem: Bookworm Ballads - A Literary Feast
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