We find your soft Utopias as white br As new-cut bread, and dull as life in cells, br O, scribes who dare forget how wild we are br How human breasts adore alarum bells. br You house us in a hive of prigs and saints br Communal, frugal, clean and chaste by law. br I’d rather brood in bloody Elsinore br Or be Lear’s fool, straw-crowned amid the straw. br Promise us all our share in Agincourt br Say that our clerks shall venture scorns and death, br That future ant-hills will not be too good br For Henry Fifth, or Hotspur, or Macbeth. br Promise that through to-morrow’s spirit-war br Man’s deathless soul will hack and hew its way, br Each flaunting Caesar climbing to his fate br Scorning the utmost steps of yesterday. br Never a shallow jester any more! br Let not Jack Falstaff spill the ale in vain. br Let Touchstone set the fashions for the wise br And Ariel wreak his fancies through the rain.