Importance

Respected brothers of the Pen
Who deem your writing will be read
By legions of the living when
Your name is numbered with the dead -
Could you foresee how soon forgot
You'll be in spite of printer's ink,
How you would realize you're not
So damned important as you think.

And so, oh mighty potentate!
Of what avail your lofty line
When to the bone-corral they crate
Your carrion as they do mine?
Could you but know how sadly soon
Into oblivion you'll sink,
Your pride will be a pricked balloon. . . .
Poor Prince! You're smaller than you think.

Besotted fools of pride and place,
Of pomp and power, of wealth and fame,
Disdainful death will fast efface
The pallid record of your name!
Take heed, ye Arrogant of Earth!
E'er to obscurity you shrink,
Time takes the measure of your worth,
And you are smaller than you think -
Aye, vastly smaller than you think.