(A GREAT HOUSEHOLDER)

Meridian man, Enstomacher,
For whom the whole world's fruits are fare,
For whom all Life is but a Feast,
And all the world a future Guest!

Spread out the Board, dispense the cost,
There's not a moment to be lost
Until the Mystic Wine and Bread
Are guzzled and engulleted!

Others on canvas spend their soul,
You on the tablecloth and bowl;
And as you fill, proceed to quote
What Shakespeare and Sam Johnson wrote.

We take our seats at your commands,
Upon the fare stretch forth our hands;
And grow amazed, while grows the drinking,
To hear your hobby is clear thinking.

Your table, like a moon silvern,
Shows what a kitchen sun you burn,
An alternating sun that heats
The growing herbs and lowing meats.

O Tableland! O plain of Troy,
Whereon we wage the wars of joy!
You, Agamemnon to our force,
Big-bellied as the Trojan horse!

Well marshalled by your genial roar,
The servants massed in order pour
The blood some thirsty summer shed,
Now ten years rising from the dead.

Still from your cellars' costly glooms
Each bottle like an Orpheus comes,
And bends his golden neck till we
Can all but clasp Eurydice.

A Victory plunges through the air.
As well as Love, wine casts out fear!
The butler's Marathon goes round,
And still your friends orchestral sound.

The artists are in heart to join;
There's scholarship in each sirloin:
" Do you prefer it brown or red?
" What did you say that Shakespeare said?

" The book is somewhere on my shelves:
" Yes; God helps those who help themselves ...
" Don't mind, my Friend, it's only froth
" I like a dappled tablecloth!

" Wine should not make a man afeared.
" A chewing chin won't spoil your beard.
" Well, let your stomach fight it out,
" Starvation's no soft cure for gout, "

Thanks, thanks! For this (I won't refuse)
Opens the lips of every Muse,
Makes us expand, makes trouble cease
And brings the broad Tiberian peace.

Magee no longer thinks alone,
Clarke talks and rouses silent Hone,
While booming through the mist is heard,
Responsible, the clear-thought word

I cannot move, I will not speak
Without Parnassus' second peak:
The Friend to whom you oft refer,
Your cousin dear and echoer.

Once you fill up the ravening Maw,
There's not a doubt about the Law.
Just cut that chicken through the girth,
I'm battling here for peace on Earth.

But there's a thirst I cannot slake
Till water-lilies drink a lake,
For I must get inside the cup
If I would drink what bears me up.

Once like your Body bulged the Earth,
Pear-shaped, before the Moon had birth.
O keep your tropic waistcoat tight,
Your Belly may fly off to-night!

And, mounted to the heavenly dome,
Another Moon would light us home,
Fair as the ocean shell that rose,
And harvest-full and grandiose!

Born of your bounty, take my Song
Redounding, like a dinner gong,
Translunary recorder pale
Of how your guests you can regale.

Till all the Earth's volcanic heat
Shall bear a better heart to beat,
Fame shall not fail you, generous man,
Magnificent meridian!