THE ADEPT

 

         Practiced he for half a hundred years

         Collecting formulae through failures tears

         Potions boiled, amulets found

         Secret words whispered and demons bound;

         Finally, the problem solved,

         The major gateway found . . .

 

         Hoping to bring his quest to an end

         The laws of nature he did bend,

         With the prefect ritual precisely performed

         to his will was the universe reformed . . .

 

         And in a puff of smoke he arrived before

         The long sought Master's door . . .

         The words of a sign that there did hang

         In the Adept's head heart-brokenly rang,

         One thing from his plans was missin' . . .

         The master's sign did read: "Gone fishin'."

 

                                          c. 1974