Free Grooks by Piet Hein Page B

appeal
    of that which we can taste and feel.

ON PROBLEMS
    Our choicest plans
    have fallen through.
    our airiest castles
    tumbled over,
    because of lines
    we neatly drew
    and later neatly
    stumbled over.

AN ETHICAL GROOK
    I see
    and I hear
    and I speak no evil;
    I carry
    no malice
    within my breast;
    yet quite without
    wishing
    a man to the Devil
    one may be
    permitted
    to hope for the best.

LILAC TIME
    The lilacs are flowering, sweet and sublime,
    with a perfume that goes to the head;
    and lovers meander in prose and rhyme,
    trying to say—
    for the thousandth time—
    what’s easier done than said.

THE DOUBLE-DOOR EFFECT
    Double doors are justified
    because they’re comfortably wide.
    Therefore you only half undo’em;
    and therefore nothing can get through ‘em.

FORETASTE WITH AFTERTASTE
    Corinna’s scanty evening dress
    reveals her charms to an excess
    which makes a fellow lust for less.

MAJORITY RULE
    His party was the Brotherhood of Brothers,
    and there were more of them than of the others.
    That is. they constituted that minority
    which formed the greater part of the majority.
    Within the party, he was of the faction
    that was supported by the greater fraction.
    And in each group. within each group, he sought
    the group that could command the most support.
    The final group had finally elected
    a triumvirate whom they all respected,
    Now of these three, two had the final word,
    because the two could overrule the third.
    One of these two was relatively weak,
    so one alone stood at the final peak.
    He was: THE GREATER NUMBER of the pair
    which formed the most part of the three that were
    elected by the most of those whose boast
    it was to represent the most of most
    of most of most of the entire state—
    or of the most of it at any rate.
    He never gave himself a moment’s slumber
    but sought the welfare of the greatest number,
    And all the people, everywhere they went,
    knew to their cost exactly what it meant
    to be dictated to by the majority,
    But that meant nothing,—they were the minority.

EXPERTS
    Experts have
    their expert fun
    ex cathedra
    telling one
    just how nothing
    can be done.

ATOMYRIADES
    Nature. it seems, is the popular name
    for milliards and milliards and milliards
    of particles playing their infinite game
    of billiards and billiards and billiards.

ROAD SENSE
    God save us, now they’re murdering
    another winding road,
    and another lovely countryside
    will take another load
    of pantechnicon and car and motorbike.
    They’re busy making bigger roads,
    and better roads and more,
    so that people can discover
    even faster than before
    that everything is everywhere alike.

OUR NOBLEST ACHIEVEMENT
    We must expect posterity
    to view with some asperity
    the marvels and the wonders
    we’re passing on to it;
    but it should change its attitude
    to one of heartfelt gratitude
    when thinking of the blunders
    we didn’t quite commit.

THE TRUE DEFENCE
    The only defence
    that is more than pretence
    is to act on the fact
    that there is no defence.

PAST PLUPERFECT
    The past,—well, its just like
    our Great-Aunt Laura.
    who cannot or will not perceive
    that though she is welcome,
    and though we adore her.
    yet now it is time to leave.

MY FAITH IN DOCTORS
    My faith in doctors
    in immense
    just one thing spoils it
    their pretence
    of authorised
    omniscience.

DEFENCE WANTED
    In International
    Consequences
    the players must reckon
    to reap what they’ve sown.
    We have a defence
    against other defences,
    but what’s to defend us
    against our own?

GETTING DOWN TO FUNDAMENTALS
    It will steadily shrink,
    our earthly abode,
    until antipode stands
    upon antipode.
    Then, soles together,
    the planet gone,
    we’ll know the ground
    that we rest upon.

GROOK TO STIMULATE GRATITUDE
    in sour rationalists.
    As things so
    very often are
    intelligence
    won’t get you far.
    So be glad
    you’ve got more sense
    than you’ve got
    intelligence.

MISSING LINK
    Man’s a kind
    of Missing Link,
    fondly thinking
    he can