MAPPAMUNDI II

Some say it began in Paris, when a certain Daphne

Dubois, fresh from sleep at a wooden inlaid table,

Devoured three mint toothpicks and the front page

Of Le Temps Perdu—they had to saw her loose from her chair.

Next, in München, Günter Holz shed six tense brown leaves;

And, in South Brooklyn, Hyman Nussbaum, on the way to work,

By subway, spilled a bushelful of walnuts out of his hair.

Two weeks later, a grandson of Firbank sent pine-cones

And needles to the Queen; and, at last, Felicity Wood,

In Kansas, became a cedar. The trees took revenge:

An elm became a Congressman; a linden ein Lehrer;

And seventy-five fairfaced Mulberry trees set fires

In nations where laboring silkworms were in prison.