Lest We Forget! A Poem
LEST WE FORGET!
The World is Round and Very Wet!
By Bob Brown
Pilsener beer from a
tall frosted glass
at Luchow’s
Grandma’s dark elderberry win
with mystery and
Edgar Allan Poe
lurking in it
Scuppernong
from the soft South
Red ink in glutinous
stiletto-eyed
spaghetti dumps
Lavish richness of
Boldini canvases and
1904 Chateau Yquem
Crusty Napoleon brandy
just polishing off its
first hundred years
Whisky and soda
sticky warm
at the United Arts Club
in Piccadilly
Amontillado and vats of
Christ’s last tears
in Jerez
Swedish punch in Stockholm
an “Oley” at the Viking
in Montparnasse
Toothsome aguardiente
for molar trouble
Jersey Apple Jack
singing “All Bound Round
With a Woolen String”
Stone ale at
Sweet’s on Front Street
Black bitter stout
brewed from tar-paper
A spice-scented Benedictine
for halitosis
Forbidden Fruit from
an orange-shaped flask
in a neighbor’s basement
Rum blacker than the bar-tender
on the wharves of Jamaica
Warm rice wine
like soft Spring rain
with Micho Ito
Fruity port
in the butler’s pantry
Milky pulque
and a slimy green palm drink
out of a drug store window bowl
in Tehauntepec
Arrac with a refugee
on a bale of oriental rugs
in other wise colorless Corfu
Head-tightening chicha
from a bull’s horn
at the cattle fair
in Santiago de Chile
Pimm’s Cup topped with
innocent blue-eyed borage
soft thistle down
in the throat
Turkish coffee
in the cool dusk
of the Grand Bazaar
at Stamboul
A stiff powdered sprig of mint
beckoning from the
joyous julep
at the American Club, London
The last bottle of
Chateau La Tour Blanche
in Texas
A goe of saki
in Nagasaki
celebrating on golden tatami
with a rainbow of geisha girls
A bottle-fountain of
sparkling Bungundy
bubbling in honor of Bacchus
Honey-tongued mead
direct descendant of the
Middle Ages
A mast of Märzen at the
Oktoberfest
serpent-tongued Chartreuse
one eye glinting yellow
the other winking green
Red mata ratos in Sevilleéeéure Death—
to mice and men
but a pleasant one
A brimming communion cup
full of Kirschwasser
Cherry brandy
crimson as a lip-stick kiss
a sizzling Sazzerack
in old New Orleans
throat-lightning
pitch-forked in the gullet
A Romos gin fizz
backed up
by a dozen cock oysters
Eau de Vie de Danzig
the gold-tooth dentist
Cocktail Mexicano
quaintly flavored with oil of
worms of maguey
Cool kummel
from a swan-necked bottle
with an inviting spray of
sugar coated Edelweiss
sparkling as Christmas frost
Anis del Mono
bottled Spanish sunshine
Persian rose-water tipples
called “Bottled Kisses”
by the dimple naveled
ladies of Mohammed’s Court
Tokay from a finger-stopper flask
at Little Hungary
brighter than all Budapest
Pousse café
a ring at a time
like the tail of a marmoset
Absinthe dripped from
Les Fleurs de Mal
of Baudelaire
Aristocratic vodka and
humble paraty
Pisco stiffly erect
with a sword
for a back-bone
Standing on a chair
in St. Pauli
to gurgle a kugel and
Tanz am Tisch
Worm-woody vermouth
Starting New Years right
with Tom and Jerrys,
Crême de menthe frappé
and a cat’s glowing eyes
up a dark alley
Sherry mulled with a poker in
a Greenwich Village attic
A pail of suds
with the wash-woman
Sickish gin-and-tonics
with sickly “Limeys”
A Prairie Oyster all alone
on a dusty desert morn
Soft samshu
from a denter pewter pot
at Shanghai’s babbling
New World
Herring sizzled in cachaça
and a funnel-full of
red-eyed green swizzle
An eloquent egg-nog
frothing at the mouth
Rhine-wine and seltzer
at the old weinstube
on Union Square
ten cents a big bumper
Bobbing for luscious hazel-nuts
in swell champagne cocktails
Strawberry Capri
from a golden-strawed bottle
A tall Tom Collins and
a long thirst.
*The poem first appeared in Bob Brown’s Nomadness (Dodd, Mead, 1931).
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