Fame by Leonard Bacon

Fame

by Leonard Bacon

As I came down into the Place of Spain,

Above the motors tooting in the streets

I heard a voice that asked, “Well, who was Keats?”

In the best accent of Nebraska’s plain.

A thin but rigid female, who in vain

Perused her Baedeker’s close-printed sheets,

Answered: “An Irish Poet,” scattering sweets

Of information to the Vast Inane.

Who was he? A voice, forgotten in some quarters

Apparently. The mortal lyric cry

Stilled by the house where the man came to die;

A lost identity of long ago;

Music and love quenched by the many waters.

Who was he? Do the critics really know?