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The last addiction of the
Banquet Hall
When music, wine and women
cease to thrill
- Is scholarship. When all is
fed and full
The glutton mind for lore is
hungry still.
My youthful appetite once
whet
Through shelves of ripening
books I madly ate,
Consuming works of experts
old and new
Who peddle lies they
half-believe are true.
Thus contradicting flavours
filled my mind
Rendering science lame,
religion blind.
Explain why 'expertise' - if
not a game
Refutes its peers, when all
should know the same.
So like a sleuth I questioned
every work
And straightened each bent
truth that tried to shirk
Its duty to maintain its
rightful place
- And by this toil returned
their lies to grace.
I was a master glutton in my
time,
Could stomach every kind of
verse and rhyme
And munch the dry old
scientific fare
But now my belly has gone
slack with care.
"I can't contain the lore of
man," I sigh
"Nor learn the merest part
before I die.
There's so much pastry all
around the pie,
Give me the plum and let the
rest go by..."
My belly-mind was bettered by
the feat
And now in modest measure do
I eat
And chew it well, and
thoroughly digest
- A little scripture, aye,
and leave the rest.
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