Shapes of Clay

In that fair city, Ispahan,

There dwelt a problematic man,

Whose angel never was released,

Who never once let out his beast,

But kept, through all the seasons' round,

Silence unbroken and profound.

No Prophecy, with ear applied

To key-hole of the future, tried

Successfully to catch a hint

Of what he'd do nor when begin 't;

As sternly did his past defy

Mild Retrospection's backward eye.

Though all admired his silent ways,

The women loudest were in praise:

For ladies love those men the most

Who never, never, never boast—

Who ne'er disclose their aims and ends

To naughty, naughty, naughty friends.

Yet, sooth to say, the fame outran

The merit of this doubtful man,

For taciturnity in him,

Though not a mere caprice or whim,

Was not a virtue, such as truth,

High birth, or beauty, wealth or youth.

'Twas known, indeed, throughout the span

Of Ispahan, of Gulistan—

These utmost limits of the earth

Knew that the man was dumb from birth.

Unto the Sun with deep salaams

The Parsee spreads his morning palms

(A beacon blazing on a height

Warms o'er his piety by night.)

The Moslem deprecates the deed,

Cuts off the head that holds the creed,

Then reverently goes to grass,

Muttering thanks to Balaam's Ass

For faith and learning to refute

Idolatry so dissolute!

But should a maniac dash past,

With straws in beard and hands upcast,

To him (through whom, whene'er inclined

To preach a bit to Madmankind,

The Holy Prophet speaks his mind)

Our True Believer lifts his eyes

Devoutly and his prayer applies;

But next to Solyman the Great

Reveres the idiot's sacred state.

Small wonder then, our worthy mute

Was held in popular repute.

Had he been blind as well as mum,

Been lame as well as blind and dumb,

No bard that ever sang or soared

Could say how he had been adored.

More meagerly endowed, he drew

An homage less prodigious. True,

No soul his praises but did utter—

All plied him with devotion's butter,

But none had out—'t was to their credit—

The proselyting sword to spread it.

I state these truths, exactly why

The reader knows as well as I;

They've nothing in the world to do

With what I hope we're coming to

If Pegasus be good enough

To move when he has stood enough.

Egad! his ribs I would examine

Had I a sharper spur than famine,

Or even with that if 'twould incline

To examine his instead of mine.

Where was I? Ah, that silent man

Who dwelt one time in Ispahan—

He had a name—was known to all

As Meerza Solyman Zingall.

There lived afar in Astrabad,

A man the world agreed was mad,

So wickedly he broke his joke

Upon the heads of duller folk,

So miserly, from day to day,

He gathered up and hid away

In vaults obscure and cellars haunted

What many worthy people wanted,

A stingy man!—the tradesmen's palms

Were spread in vain: "I give no alms

Without inquiry"—so he'd say,

And beat the needy duns away.

The bastinado did, 'tis true,

Persuade him, now and then, a few

Odd tens of thousands to disburse

To glut the taxman's hungry purse,

But still, so rich he grew, his fear

Was constant that the Shah might hear.

(The Shah had heard it long ago,

And asked the taxman if 'twere so,

Who promptly answered, rather airish,

The man had long been on the parish.)

The more he feared, the more he grew

A cynic and a miser, too,

Until his bitterness and pelf

Made him a terror to himself;

Then, with a razor's neckwise stroke,

He tartly cut his final joke.

So perished, not an hour too soon,

The wicked Muley Ben Maroon.

From Astrabad to Ispahan

At camel speed the rumor ran

That, breaking through tradition hoar,

And throwing all his kinsmen o'er,

The miser'd left his mighty store

Of gold—his palaces and lands—

To needy and deserving hands

(Except a penny here and there

To pay the dervishes for prayer.)

'Twas known indeed throughout the span

Of earth, and into Hindostan,

That our beloved mute was the

Residuary legatee.

The people said 'twas very well,

And each man had a tale to tell

Of how he'd had a finger in 't

By dropping many a friendly hint

At Astrabad, you see. But ah,

They feared the news might reach the Shah!

To prove the will the lawyers bore 't

Before the Kadi's awful court,

Who nodded, when he heard it read,

Confirmingly his drowsy head,

Nor thought, his sleepiness so great,

Himself to gobble the estate.

"I give," the dead had writ, "my all

To Meerza Solyman Zingall

Of Ispahan. With this estate

I might quite easily create

Ten thousand ingrates, but I shun

Temptation and create but one,

In whom the whole unthankful crew

The rich man's air that ever drew

To fat their pauper lungs I fire

Vicarious with vain desire!

From foul Ingratitude's base rout

I pick this hapless devil out,

Bestowing on him all my lands,

My treasures, camels, slaves and bands

Of wives—I give him all this loot,

And throw my blessing in to boot.

Behold, O man, in this bequest

Philanthropy's long wrongs redressed:

To speak me ill that man I dower

With fiercest will who lacks the power.

Allah il Allah! now let him bloat

With rancor till his heart's afloat,

Unable to discharge the wave

Upon his benefactor's grave!"

Forth in their wrath the people came

And swore it was a sin and shame

To trick their blessed mute; and each

Protested, serious of speech,

That though he'd long foreseen the worst

He'd been against it from the first.

By various means they vainly tried

The testament to set aside,

Each ready with his empty purse

To take upon himself the curse;

For they had powers of invective

Enough to make it ineffective.

The ingrates mustered, every man,

And marched in force to Ispahan

(Which had not quite accommodation)

And held a camp of indignation.

The man, this while, who never spoke—

On whom had fallen this thunder-stroke

Of fortune, gave no feeling vent

Nor dropped a clue to his intent.

Whereas no power to him came

His benefactor to defame,

Some (such a length had slander gone to)

Even whispered that he didn't want to!

But none his secret could divine;

If suffering he made no sign,

Until one night as winter neared

From all his haunts he disappeared—

Evanished in a doubtful blank

Like little crayfish in a bank,

Their heads retracting for a spell,

And pulling in their holes as well.

All through the land of Gul, the stout

Young Spring is kicking Winter out.

The grass sneaks in upon the scene,

Defacing it with bottle-green.

The stumbling lamb arrives to ply

His restless tail in every eye,

Eats nasty mint to spoil his meat

And make himself unfit to eat.

Madly his throat the bulbul tears—

In every grove blasphemes and swears

As the immodest rose displays

Her shameless charms a dozen ways.

Lo! now, throughout the utmost span

Of Ispahan—of Gulistan—

A big new book's displayed in all

The shops and cumbers every stall.

The price is low—the dealers say 'tis—

And the rich are treated to it gratis.

Engraven on its foremost page

These title-words the eye engage:

"The Life of Muley Ben Maroon,

Of Astrabad—Rogue, Thief, Buffoon

And Miser—Liver by the Sweat

Of Better Men: A Lamponette

Composed in Rhyme and Written all

By Meerza Solyman Zingall!"