Imaginary garden with a new (old) toad

I've double-checked and re-double-checked, and Kerry of the writers' group Imaginary Garden with Real Toads says about this week's Calling all Toads: we invite members and visitors alike to share a poem, either old or new.

It says nothing there about original or wrote-it-myself, so I find I've simply got to share this very old, very delightful poem written in 1927 by the author and old newspaperman, Don Marquis.


I first read this poem in one of my favorite books: archy and mehitabel, in which authorship of the poem is attributed to archy, one of the title characters, a vers libre bard who died and whose soul transmigrated into the body of a cockroach.








If Don Marquis were alive today, he'd be 133 years old, according to the website dedicated to him, and, I believe, he'd still be writing.


For those of you who haven't already met this character, I would like to introduce someone I talk about more often than you might suspect: a toad I find myself wanting to talk about every time I visit Imaginary Garden with Real Toads. He might be an imaginary toad, but there is a very real lesson in here somewhere.


warty bliggens the toad

i met a toad
the other day by the name
of warty bliggens
he was sitting under
a toadstool
feeling contented
he explained that when the cosmos
was created
that toadstool was especially
planned for his personal
shelter from sun and rain
thought out and prepared
for him

do not tell me
said warty bliggens
that there is not a purpose
in the universe
the thought is blasphemy
a little more
conversation revealed
that warty bliggens
considers himself to be
the center of the same
universe
the earth exists
to grow toadstools for him
to sit under
the sun to give him light
by day and the moon
and wheeling constellations
to make beautiful
the night for the sake of
warty bliggens

to what act of yours
do you impute
this interest on the part
of the creator
of the universe
i asked him
why is it that you
are so greatly favored

ask rather
said warty bliggens
what the universe
has done to deserve me
if i were a
human being i would
not laugh
too complacently
at poor warty bliggens
for similar
absurdities
have only too often
lodged in the crinkles
of the human cerebrum

                                       — archy