It helps to have a pedigree
though some pumpkins live perfectly swell lives without them
to grow through litigious lines of aesthetic concepts
only to suffer the indignity of Halloween
when I was mistaken for my mutt
and didn’t bitch much. Kafka was still a puppy
and a grey-jowled Tolstoy gnawed his microchip
Chekhov’s bite was worse than his bark (he is, of course, a lap dog!)
When Adam delved and Eva span, who was then the lit’ry man?
one on either foot, well-healed despite the limp
it’s better still to have a degree
and better still to have integrity that will not submit to such tradition
the way Dickens hated America locked in his room
the way the public eye narrows and twitches in its burrow
the ways of the world (despite all the bitchin’!)
still give weight to the papered trail
who needs paper toys, when money buries away all the cares of that world
and the caves speak of the sea
and Spooks is back on the BBC.
when the masses bay for blood-
       a seat in Lords protects the back
       the way a Commons post cannot -
       so how much for a pedigree?
       Do tell me, sir, I’ll write a cheque right now.
Let’s barter, then.
       And decide together.
i’ll take russia, you japan, he can have africa, and she the amercias,
       the cousins can divide up europe, so that leaves the rest to good old uncle george
a testament to faith
       this covenant of chosen
       whose righteousness steals