Red-nosed gnomes roll and tumble Tussle and jumble in the firelight Roll on their backs spinning rotundly, Out of earthern jars Gloriously gurgitating, Wriggling their huge round bellies. And the air of the cave is heavy With steaming Marsala and rum And hot bruised vanilla. Champagne-colored, one lies in a velvetiness Of yellow moths stirring faintly tickling wings One is heavy and full of languor And sleep is a champagne-colored coverlet, the champagne-colored stockings of Venus ... And later One goes And pukes beautifully beneath the moon, Champagne-colored. II ODE TO ENNUI The autumn leaves that this morning danced with the wind, curtseying in slow minuettes, giddily whirling in bacchanals, balancing, hesitant, tiptoe, while the wind whispered of distant hills, and clouds like white sails, sailing in limpid green ice-colored skies, have crossed the picket fence and the three strands of barbed wire; they have leapt the green picket fence despite the sentry's bayonet. Under the direction of a corporal three soldiers in khaki are sweeping them up, sweeping up the autumn leaves, crimson maple leaves, splotched with saffron, ochre and cream, brown leaves of horse-chestnuts ... and the leaves dance and curtsey round the brooms, full of mirth, wistful of the journey the wind promised them. This morning the leaves fluttered gaudily, reckless, giddy from the wind's dances, over the green picket fence and the three strands of barbed wire. Now they are swept up and put in a garbage can with cigarette butts and chewed-out quids of tobacco, burnt matches, old socks, torn daily papers, and dust from the soldiers' blankets. And the wind blows tauntingly over the mouth of the garbage can, whispering, Far away, mockingly, Far away ... And I too am swept up and put in a garbage can with smoked cigarette ash and chewed-out quids of tobacco; I am fallen into the dominion of the great dusty queen ... Ennui, iron goddess, cobweb-clothed goddess of all useless things, of attics cluttered with old chairs for centuries unsatupon, of strong limbs wriggling on office stools, of ancient cab-horses and cabs that sleep all day in silent sunny squares, of camps bound with barbed wire, and green picket fences-- bind my eyes with your close dust choke my ears with your grey cobwebs that I may not see the clouds that sail away across the sky, far away, tauntingly, that I may not hear the wind that mocks and whispers and is gone in pursuit of the horizon. III TIVOLI TO D. P.