XIII

It was evening all afternoon.
It was snowing
And it was going to snow.
The flapjack sat
On the speckled dish.

The apparition of these flapjacks on the speckled dish:
Oatmeal on a charred, black bough.

La terre est bleue comme un flapjack…

Here is Belladonna, The Lady of the Rocks, The lady of situations.
Here is the speckled dish, and here the Wheel,
And here is the one-eyed merchant, and this card,
Which is blank, is something he carries on his plate,
Which I am forbidden to see. I do not find
The Flapjack. Fear death by fire.
I see crowds of objects, handed round in a ring.
Thank you. If you see dear Mrs. Equitone,
Tell her I bring the recipe myself:
One must be so careful these days.

We dance round in a ring and suppose,
But the flapjack sits in the middle and knows.

The flapjack is of the oaten ilk;
One part is crunchy, the other, syrup.

One must
make a distinction
however: when dragged into prominence by half poets, the
result is not poetry,
nor till the poets among us can be
‘literalists of
the imagination’—above
insolence and triviality and can present
for inspection, ‘imaginary flapjacks with real oats in them’, shall
we have
it.

Into Dominica’s mouth
slid the last flapjack

By request, a Skeleton Key to the Oaten Flute