A Tribute to the Poet, Ogden Nash (1902-1971)

"... my field -- the minor idiocies of humanity" 

A Caution to Everybody

Consider the auk;
Becoming extinct because he forgot how to fly, and could only walk.
Consider man, who may well become extinct
Because he forgot how to walk and learned how to fly before he thinked.
 

No, You be a Lone Eagle

I find it very hard to be fair-minded
About people who go around being air-minded.
I just can't see any fun
In soaring up up up into the sun
When the chances are still a fresh cool orchid to a paper geranium
That you'll unsoar down down down onto your (to you) invaluable
    cranium.
I know the constant refrain
About how safer up in God's trafficless heaven than in an automobile
    or a train
But ...
My God, have you ever taken a good look at a strut?
Then that one about how you're in Boston before you can say antidis-
    establishmentarianism
So that preferring to take five hours by rail is a pernicious example of
    antiquarianism.
At least when I get on the Boston train I have a good chance of landing
    in the South Station
And not in that part of the daily press which is reserved for victims of
    aviation.
Then, despite the assurance that aeroplanes are terribly comfortable I
    notice that when you are railroading or automobiling
You don't have to take a paper bag along just in case of a funny feeling.
It seems to me that no kind of depravity
Brings such speedy retribution as ignoring the law of gravity.
Therefore nobody could possibly indict me for perjury
When I swear that I wish the Wright brothers had gone in for silver
    fox farming or tree surgery.

---

Previous Occasions

• Valentine: To My Valentine, The Sniffle
• Winter: One Third of the Calendar, Oh to be Odd!
• Columbus Day: Look What You Did, Cristopher!
• Halloween/Walpurgis: A Tale of the Thirteenth Floor

Return to: Selected Poems by OgdenNash