Ladies and gents, you are here assembled
To hear why earth and heaven trembled
Because of the black and sinister arts
Of an Irish writer[24] in foreign parts.
He sent me a book[25] ten years ago:
I read it a hundred times or so,
Backwards and forwards, down and up,
Through both the ends of a telescope.
I printed it all to the very last word
But by the mercy of the Lord
The darkness of my mind was rent
And I saw the writer’s foul intent.
But I owe a duty to Ireland:
I hold her honour in my hand,
This lovely land that always sent
Her writers and artists to banishment[26]
And in a spirit of Irish fun
Betrayed her own leaders, one by one.
’Twas Irish humour, wet and dry[27],
Flung quicklime into Parnell’s eye[28];
’Tis Irish brains that save from doom
The leaky barge of the Bishop of Rome
For everyone knows the Pope[29] can’t belch
Without the consent of Billy Walsh[30].
O Ireland my first and only love
Where Christ and Caesar are hand and glove!
O lovely land where the shamrock[31] grows!
(Allow me, ladies, to blow my nose)
To show you for strictures I don’t care a button
I printed the poems of Mountainy Mutton[32]
And a play he wrote[33] (you’ve read it, I’m sure)
Where they talk of ‘bastard’, ‘bugger’ and ‘whore’,
And a play on the Word and Holy Paul
And some woman’s legs that I can’t recall,
Written by Moore[34], a genuine gent
That lives on his property’s ten per cent:
I printed mystical books in dozens:
I printed the table-book of Cousins[35]
Though (asking your pardon) as for the verse
’Twould give you a heartburn[36] on your arse:
I printed folklore from North and South
By Gregory[37] of the Golden Mouth:
I printed poets, sad, silly and solemn:
I printed Patrick What-do-you-Colm[38]:
I printed the great John Milicent Synge[39]
Who soars above on an angel’s wing
In the playboy shift that he pinched as swag
From Maunsel’s manager’s travelling-bag[40].
But I draw the line at that bloody fellow[41]
That was over here dressed in Austrian yellow,
Spouting Italian by the hour
To O’Leary Curtis and John Wyse Power[42]
And writing of Dublin, dirty and dear[43],
In a manner no blackamoor printer could bear.
Shite and onions[44]! Do you think I’ll print
The name of the Wellington Monument,
Sydney Parade and Sandymount tram,
Downes’s cakeshop and Williams’s jam[45]?
I’m damned if I do — I’m damned to blazes!
Talk about Irish Names of Places[46]!
It’s a wonder to me, upon my soul,
He forgot to mention Curly’s Hole[47].
No, ladies, my press shall have no share in
So gross a libel[48] on Stepmother Erin[49].
I pity the poor — that’s why I took
A red-headed Scotchman[50] to keep my book.
Poor sister Scotland! Her doom is fell;
She cannot find any more Stuarts[51] to sell.
My conscience is fine as Chinese silk:
My heart is as soft as buttermilk.
Colm can tell you I made a rebate
Of one hundred pounds on the estimate
I gave him for his Irish Review[52].
I love my country — by herrings I do[53]!
I wish you could see what tears I weep
When I think of the emigrant train and ship[54].
That’s why I publish far and wide
My quite illegible railway guide,
In the porch of my printing institute
The poor and deserving prostitute
Plays every night at catch-as-catch-can
With her tight-breeched British artilleryman
And the foreigner learns the gift of the gab
From the drunken draggletail Dublin drab.
Who was it said: Resist not evil[55]?
I’ll burn that book, so help me devil[56].
I’ll sing a psalm as I watch it burn
And the ashes I’ll keep in a one-handled urn.
I’ll penance do with farts and groans
Kneeling upon my marrowbones.
This very next lent I will unbare
My penitent buttocks to the air
And sobbing beside my printing press
My awful sin I will confess.
My Irish foreman from Bannockburn[57]
Shall dip his right hand in the urn
And sign crisscross with reverent thumb
Memento homo upon my bum[58].