Walter Taylor, 1884-1970
"His most prized possession was a valuable first edition of Edward Fitzgerald's translation of The Rubaiyat." --a great-nephew's recollection
Hell for him
was forty years of
of serving Jax to the agricolae.
Through endless,
stifling afternoons and eves of
Bogalusa's paper smells
no Jamshyd,
Sultan,or Mahmud
sipped rarest wine
from goblet there
in his sad inn where
Omar's verses turned into
obscenities on toilet walls,
where Saki always seemed to be
a blowzy waitress wheedling dimes
for Nashville juke-box tunes.For him, O friend,
Turn down an empty glass.
-- Warren F. O'Rourke, 1975