Portrait

Painter, would you make my picture?

Just forget the moral stricture.

Let me sit

With my belly to the table,

Swilling all the wine I'm able,

Pip a-lit;

Not a stiff and stuffy croaker

In a frock coat and a choker

Let me be;

But a rollicking old fellow

With a visage ripe and mellow

As you see.



Just a twinkle-eyed old codger,

And of death as artful dodger,

Such I am;

I defy the Doc's advising

And I don't for sermonising

Care a damn.

Though Bill Shakespeare had in his dome

Both; I'd rather wit than wisdom

For my choice;

In the glug glug of the bottle,

As I tip it down my throttle,

I rejoice.



Paint me neither sour not soulful,

For I would not have folks doleful

When I go;

So if to my shade you're quaffing

I would rather see you laughing,

As you know.

In Life's Great Experiment

I'll have heaps of merriment

E're I pass;

And though devil beckons me,

And I've many a speck on me,

Maybe some will recon me -

Worth a glass.