The New Omar

by Gilbert Keith Chesterton

A Book of verses underneath the bough,
     Provided that the verses do not scan,
A loaf of bread, a jug of wine and Thou,
     Short-haired, all angles, looking like a man.

But let the wine be unfermented, Pale,
     Of chemicals compounded, God knows how-
This were indeed the Prophet's Paradise,
     O Paradise were Wilderness enow.