Gorged with paper, study drunk on ink,
Animals starve the body for the mind.
Sheer fact reveals chinks and makes them rethink
The confines of books, the treaty they signed.
Three fools turned sonneteers try to catch fires,
Taffeta phrases, silken terms precise.
Rhetoric of eyes persuade the liars,
Devising device to chase beauties vice.
With visage veiled, petty promises made,
Cliché does not sway nor does childish play,
Tales already told cut through charade,
The true test begins twelve-month and a day.
Barren tasks are surely fated to lapse,
Better to feast on language, stealing scraps.
Thomas Dylan Bolger 