Savant

Mozart’s position might be granite
But mine is golden, when I pan it;
Chopin may have been a gallant,
But I as critic have more talent,
Auden celebrated as a poem,
Until I decided to outgrow him,
No matter how like God he stood,
When I hinted he’s no good
His lifetime, works, and passion fell
Through my opinion into hell,
As history places me above
All the people that I love—
No matter how august, in time
The world discovers that they’re slime,
Just because of, I might say,
My own immortal exposé,
My own carte blanche, a visa
Better than the Mona Lisa,
No work of genius so implicit
That in seconds I can’t diss it;
All heroes, conquerors: my minions—
None greater than my own opinions:
Goethe, Shakespeare, who is he,
When I choose to disagree?
The weakling stumbles into verses
While I, his better, plan my curses—
Though so firmly in another class
That I’m admittedly below it,
Greatness is so much summer grass
When you can nonchalantly mow it.

November 2nd, 1999