Paradise Lost

[B. Royce 0]

Taking many liberties with Milton's Paradise Lost---

Of man's first disobedience, and the fruit

Of that forbidden tree whose mortal taste

Brought life into the world and all our joy,

With loss of falseness, when one greater man

Wrought Logic, and attained the blissful seat,

Sing, Olympian muse, that in the open light

Of Athens (bane of blindness) didst inspire

That woman who first taught the reasoning man

That no beginning gave the world a birth,

Nor was there Chaos; or if America

Delight thee more, and Great North' trains that go

Fast with their oracle of good, I thence

Invoke thy aid to my adventurous song,

That with no middle flight intends to soar

Above the Pike's Peak mount, while it pursues

Things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme.

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B.F.