Shredding the cherished story
And uprooting the flourishing "plant";
Makes one forgive
The ingratitude of artists arrived.
They who do not love me
I hope to have fear me;
There is only one hell,
And that is to be disregarded.


FIRST NIGHTS

August heat cannot weaken nor flivvers stale
Our first-night expectance when the new season opens.
Come on, boys and girls, the gang's all here;
The Death Watch is ready in orchestra chairs
Still shrouded in summer's cool slip pajamas,
And the undertakers of stage reputations
Are gathered to chatter about author and players,
And give them and their work disrespectful interment
By gleefully agreeing in that sage Broadway saying:
"Oh, what an awful oil can that piece turned out to be!"
It's hard when the Chanters of Death-House Blues
Have to turn to each other and reluctantly murmur:
"I'm afraid it's a hit--the poor fish is lucky."
First-nighters are the theatre's forty-niners,
Making the early rush to new dramatic gold fields,
And usually finding them barren.
Often must it madden the playwright to offer his ideals
To an audience whose personnel would for the most part