Poet's Note: This poem was inspired by what I read about the education of
Algernon Charles Swinburne in
A.N. Wilson's book
God's Funeral: A Biography of Faith and Doubt in Western Civilization.TemperamentA Daft Fool is within each man
Whose play untamed will turn him
About himself,
inter him
In soot of burnt
decorum,
And
ply his movements
mill.
A
man himself a lover
Is doomed to once uncover
The Fool before another,
And thence his
Daftness kill.
But
Daftness is a
virtue
And cannot be to hurt you,
Just cool you when things flame you,
And do you good he will --
If
birch him when he’s naughty,
‘Til
blood erupts his body,
You do, and 'til you’re
haughty,
So
Daftness lies there still.