The Summer Garden

Dream of an art critic

Winter is making a start,

The earth is about to freeze over,

And the statues' visitors are

Fewer and fewer and fewer.

I loiter, the last

of the great

Mastodons-

of the statues' admirers,

And the statues walk round the park

In circles,

in circles,

in circles.

I follow as best I can

And suddenly feel

that I'm turning

Into stone-still chewing fag-ends

But my lips are becoming bone,

I can barely mutter,

You, statues!

Stop walking about-

this instant!

For sure

I don't want to experience

Your stoniness and your inertness.

And still I continue to turn

Into stone-and the statues

to walk.