Frank wrote of Cyril, An ungrammatic sinner, But I wrote of Drink And Chris wrote of Dinner; And Frank kept getting thinner And we kept getting plump-- Frank sat like a Bump Translating from the Latin, Chris wrote of Happy Homes I wrote of Alcoholic Foams, And we still seemed to fatten; Frank wrote of Swell Parties where he had been, I wrote of Whisky-sours, and Chris wrote of Gin! But we both got fatter, So the parties didn't matter, Though F.P.A. he published each as soon as he'd been at her.... F.P.A. went calling And sang about it sorely ... "_Pass around the shandygaff," says brave old Morley!_ F.P.A. played tennis And told the World he did.... _I bought a stein of beer and tipped up the lid!_ Frank wrote up all his evenings out till we began to cry, _But we drowned our envy in a long cool Rye!_ And then we got an invitation, Frank and Chris and me, To come and say a poem on a Grackle in a Tree: [Illustration] But Chris and I'd had twenty ryes, and we began to cackle-- "Oh, see the ninety pretty birds, and every one a Grackle! A Grackle with a Hackle, A ticklish one to tackle A tacklish one to tickle ... To ticker ... To licker...." And we both began to giggle And woggle, and wiggle, And we giggled and we gurgled And we gargled and were gay ... _For we'd had an invitation, just the same as F.P.A.!_ _Christopher Morley_ (Acting, in spite of himself, as if the Bird were his long-lost brother, and locating the Grackle, for poetic purposes, in his own home.) THE MOCKING-HOARSE BIRD Good fowl, though I would speak to thee With wonted geniality, And Oxford charm in my address, It's not quite easy, I confess: _Suaviter in modo's_ hard When poets trample one's front yard, And this is such an enormous crew That you've got trailing after you! I'd washed my youngest child but four, Put the milk-bottles out the door, Paid my wife's hat-bill with no sigh (Ah, happy wife! Ah, happy I!) Tossed down (see essays) then my pen To be a private citizen, Written about that in the Post, When lo, upon the lawn a host Of Poets, sprung upon my sight Each eager for a Poem to write! To a less placid bard you'd be A flat domestic tragedy,-- Bird--grackle--nay, I'd scarcely call You bird--a mere egg you, that's all-- Only a bad egg has the nerve To poach (a pun!) on my preserve! To P.Q.S. and X.Y.D. (Both columnists whom you should see) And L.M.N (a man who never Columns a word that isn't clever,) And B.C.D. (who scintillates Much more than most who get his rates) A thing like this would be a trial.... It is to me, there's no denial.