My Favorite Photo Poem by gershon hepner

My favorite photo, for today
at least, is one in which the nose
of Zachary, my son, the groom, looks fey,
because his nose is luminose.

I do not want to make a song
and dance about this photo here,
but he looks too much like the Dong
described in verse by Edward Lear.

Unlike his cousins, Marcus, Julian
and Daniel, on that wintry night
he shone, and in the plain Gramboolian
he was a Monsey monster bright.

Above the walls of Snipe and Chimp
he sang and danced, and gave a ring,
as Dongs do when they are not imp-
otent, and wish to have a fling.

And when the sun set on the west,
he changed from bachelor to hus-
band; seven times he would be blessed––
with blessings no one overdoes.

Of course he must have felt most boisterous,
not yet by marriage weather-beaten,
nor bothered by the food, non-oysterous,
and in a kosher manner eaten.

I look now at the photo blanky,
amazed to have a son like that,
but will not bore you more, like Chankly,
removing now my blackest hat,

congratulating him most humbly
because, although he’d been most picky,
the girl he married wasn’t Jumbly,
but, resonating with him, Rikki.

They came together and will be
unholy in their social sieve,
where, though they’re married, they’ll be free
and happily forever live.
Inspired by a wedding photo of Zachary and Rikki looking at one another lovingly, observed by Linda and me. Because of a photographic artifact, Zak’s nose appears to be luminous. The last line is deliberately ambiguous, inspired by 1 Kgs 1: 31, in which Bathsheba prays that David will live forever, but only after she has taken steps to ensure the safety of her son Solomon in the unlikely event of David dying before he has at least reached the age of Mathuselah. (Bathsheba does not know that every one of David’s seventy years was borrowed from Adam, who only lived to be 930.) The poem was also inspired by Edward Lear’s poem, “The Dong With the Luminous Nose:
When awful darkness and silence reign
Over the great Gromboolian plain,
Through the long, long wintry nights; -
When the angry breakers roar
As they beat on the rocky shore; -
When Storm-clouds brood on the towering heights
Of the Hills of the Chankly Bore: -
Then, through the vast and gloomy dark,
There moves what seems a fiery spark,
A lonely spark with silvery rays
Piercing the coal-black night, -
A Meteor strange and bright: -
Hither and thither the vision strays,
A single lurid light.
Slowly it wanders, -pauses, -creeeps, -
Anon it sparkles, -flashes and leaps;
And ever as onward it gleaming goes
A light on the Bong-tree stems it throws.
And those who watch at that midnight hour
From Hall or Terrace, or lofty Tower,
Cry, as the wild light passes along, -
'The Dong! -the Dong!
'The wandering Dong through the forest goes!
'The Dong! the Dong!
'The Dong with a luminous Nose! '
Long years ago
The Dong was happy and gay,
Till he fell in love with a Jumbly Girl
Who came to those shores one day,
For the Jumblies came in a sieve, they did, -
Landing at eve near the Zemmery Fidd
Where the Oblong Oysters grow,
And the rocks are smooth and gray.
And all the woods and the valleys rang
With the Chorus they daily and nightly sang, -
'Far and few, far and few,
Are the lands where the Jumblies live;
Their heads are green, and their hands are blue
And they went to sea in a sieve.'
Happily, happily passed those days!
While the cheerful Jumblies staid;
They danced in circlets all night long,
To the plaintive pipe of the lively Dong,
In moonlight, shine, or shade.
For day and night he was always there
By the side of the Jumbly Girl so fair,
With her sky-blue hands, and her sea-green hair.
Till the morning came of that hateful day
When the Jumblies sailed in their sieve away,
And the Dong was left on the cruel shore
Gazing-gazing for evermore, -
Ever keeping his weary eyes on
That pea-green sail on the far horizon, -
Singing the Jumbly Chorus still
As he sate all day on the grassy hill, -
'Far and few, far and few,
Are the lands where the Jumblies live;
Their heads are green, and their hands are blue
And they went to sea in a sieve.'
But when the sun was low in the West,
The Dong arose and said; -
-'What little sense I once possessed
'Has quite gone out of my head! '-
And since that day he wanders still
By lake or forest, marsh and hill,
Singing-'O somewhere, in valley or plain
'Might I find my Jumbly Girl again!
'For ever I'll seek by lake and shore
'Till I find my Jumbly Girl once more! '
Playing a pipe with silvery squeaks,
Since then his Jumbly Girl he seeks,
And because by night he could not see,
He gathered the bark of the Twangum Tree
On the flowery plain that grows.
And he wove him a wondrous Nose, -
A Nose as strange as a Nose could be!
Of vast proportions and painted red,
And tied with cords to the back of his head.
-In a hollow rounded space it ended
With a luminous Lamp within suspended,
All fenced about
With a bandage stout
To prevent the wind from blowing it out; -
And with holes all round to send the light,
In gleaming rays on the dismal night.
And now each night, and all night long,
Over those plains still roams the Dong;
And above the wall of the Chimp and Snipe
You may hear the sqeak of his plaintive pipe
While ever he seeks, but seeks in vain
To meet with his Jumbly Girl again;
Lonely and wild-all night he goes, -
The Dong with a luminous Nose!
And all who watch at the midnight hour,
From Hall or Terrace, or lofty Tower,
Cry, as they trace the Meteor bright,
Moving along through the dreary night, -
'This is the hour when forth he goes,
'The Dong with a luminous Nose!
'Yonder-over the plain he goes,
'He goes!
'He goes;
'The Dong with a luminous Nose! '


2/18/09