The Travels of Fedoso

Canto 472

In Uzibakanaktaland
I visited their wisest man.

A bird sat honking at me goosely
From on his hat, which fit him loosely.

His aspect I dare not describe,
For no man, though however wise

Can ever, ever look his best
When on his head a goose does nest.

His rancid smell, from toe to shoulder--
Where goose extrusions rot and moulder--

Inspires nausea in the beholder
(Be he young, or be he older);

So from the bottom of my heart,
I called forth Bonisagus' Art:

"Perdo" I proclaimed, "Imagonem" I cried!
"I demand that this horrible stench now subside!

"Let these raucous goose honkings reach nobody's ear;
Let these noxious goose droppings for now disappear."

But all of the while I gestured and chanted,
The Uzibakanaktaman seemed distracted.

The drool that dripped down from his chin he ignored,
Along with a raiding barbarian horde.

Other distractions I lack words to mention
Utterly failed to disrupt his attention.

He stared at an hourglass the size of a clown
From which quartzy green sand slowly trickled down.

I asked him to tell me just what he was doing,
And the significance of what he was viewing,

But he just ignored every word that I said
Until I whacked him a few times on the head.

He said, "Notice the sand in the glass falling past.
Notice the way each grain falls past quite fast.

"This grain is now, now it falls and it's then;
The grains way up top are nobody knows when.

"Those mortals who wish to forever exist
Seek out infinite time on which to subsist.

"Such attempts must fail since they are not sound
As there is but only so much time around:

"Even as all of the sand in the sea,
On the land, or wheresoever it might be.

"All of one's sand beneath all of the skies
Would someday run out, and on that day he dies.

"But I have concluded that time does not last
Because as it travels it goes by too fast.

"You can can live forever if you learn or know
The trick of making time move really slow.

"In my youth I once travelled to Goniwatchwo,
Beyond the Kamkuli, Zamzelitch, and Vatchlough,

"'Til I reached the land where the guardians of time
Reside in their workshops in power sublime.

"An hourglass they have for each and every creature--
And even for each geographical feature.

"From mountain to mayfly it's all in their plan.
But I found my hourglass; I took it and ran!

"I ran past the guardians and then out of their land,
And ran and I ran just as fast as I can.

"I ran past the Vatchlough, Zamezelitch, and Kamkuli,
And then the Goniwatchwo and Hulihuli.

"I chose to live here and develop my art:
As each grain of sand falls I cut it apart.

"The grain that was falling is thus cleft in twain--
One grain I let fall, but let one grain remain.

"Then with the grain that remains it's quite plain
That I can repeat this again and again.

"Since I can cut each grain increasingly fine,
The secret of immortality is mine!

"Now you who have disrupted my concentration
Must leave me now to practice my avocation.

"All of the while that we have conversed
Some sand in the glass from top to bottom traversed.

"Take the goose if you must, but get thee hence:
My labors once more I must rerecommence."

As I left I heard say that man of great sense
"I must upend this glass and unlive these events!"

So now in the twilight I think on his boasts,
While over my fire his goose slowly roasts.