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Diogenes, the cynic
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en memoriam i admire that dog Diogenes
the ancient world's Bukowski.
"i'm looking for an honest man!"
he replied,
when asked by a senator
why he was walking
through the city square
holding a lantern
in broad daylight.
"if only it were so easy
to banish hunger
by rubbing my belly"
his rebuttal
at being scolded
for masturbating in public.
"in a rich man's house
there's no place to spit
but his face,"
this particular aphorism
explains why he didn't get
invited to many dinner parties.
"the big thieves are leading
the little thief away!"
he exclaimed,
as the temple priests carried
the petty thief to jail...
"stand a little out of my sun"
he said to Alexander,
emperor of Macedon;
imagine the balls
it must have taken
to insult Alexander the Great!
then, Diogenes,
looking through a pile of bones,
was asked by the king of the world,
"what are you searching for?"
"i'm searching for the bones of your father
but cannot distinguish them
from the bones of a slave..."
knowing their mutual end
would be the grave.
and at the time
he came to die,
Diogenes,
cold with dropsy
buried himself in manure
to keep warm
and breathed his last...
i admire that dog Diogenes
the ancient world's Bukowski,
but i'm glad that i'm not him.
