But the Back is father to the Front. All's young
Before. Behind from occiput to bung
All's old as is creation. Nature's face
Is accidental with the functional maze:
Not so that polished nothingness that goes
With all that lives, its hindmost end to close.
Let us praise Backs! — the Back at least is chaste —
That that can keep its place, let it be praised!
Possessing the art most tactfully to dress
Nonentity in a black magnificentness.
Let that even above Fronts be loudly praised!
(Best to be nowt, too, than a negative thing —
So praise the reverse of what we are out to sing.)
Happy the Back that knows not its own Front,
However much unvisited, unsunned!
Oh lucky Backs that without gadgets are
Of Time's manufacture. Balistraria,
Teeth, tentacles and all the rest of it
Are left to the busy Fronts to interpret.
The biped finally's the better model
For the perfect Back — a blank from heel to noddle.