the thirty fourth street
side of the
Pennsylvania station
he could not fall down as
fast as it
carried him up again but
he was game he kept on
trying he was
stubborn about it
evidently it was a part of
his tradition habit and
training always to fall down
stairs when intoxicated and
he did not intend to
be defeated this time i
watched him for an hour
and moved sadly away thinking
how much sorrow
drink is responsible for the
buns by great men
reached and kept
are not attained
by sudden flight but they
while their companions slept
were falling upwards
through the night
archy
an awful warning
dear boss i was walking along
the curbstone yesterday
and i ran spang into an old bum
who was sitting happily
in the gutter singing
in part as follows
oh i ruined my prospects
by wicked desires
which i put into action
as far as i could
but now i ve arrived
within sight of hell fires
and i wish i d done better
i wish i d been good
as i sit in the gutter
and look at the sky
the man in the moon
is a looking at me
and i thinks to myself
i d have risen that high
if i had behaved myself
proper as he
now all you young fellows
and pretty young janes
as passes me by
and dont pitch me a dime
take warning by me
and avoid all the pains
which comes from remorse
in the fullness of time
and all you young fellows
thats out on a bust
and lively young flappers
so spic and so span
i oncet had a sweetheart
and me she did trust
to maintain myself always
a proper young man
i was lured to a barroom
and there i was tempted
for the bartender cried
be a man and drink rum
and after that first
glass of liquor i emptied
i found myself jobless
and went on the bum
now all you young fellows
and flappers so gay
that passes me by
and dont toss me a cent
there oncet was a time
when i went on my way
with ladylike janes
like an elegant gent
now i sits in the gutter
and looks at the stars
and wish i had always
behaved and been good
and never drunk rum
at them elegant bars
and never been wicked
as much as i could
you gents and your girl friends
should tip an old man
for his horrid example
of not being good
you must try and behave
in so far as you can
you should toss me a dime
for my warning you should
archy
may emulate the tumble bug
as it looks to archy
ants go on their cheerful way
merrily from day to day
building cities out of sand
and they seem to understand
dwelling therein peacefully
disciplined and orderly
and the much lauded bee contrives
for to fill his thundering hives
with a ranked society
based on work and honesty
and a thousand neat examples
could i cite of insect lives
free from much that tears and tramples
human beings and their wives
even the coral in the ocean
throughout his dim and damp existence
scorns political commotion
and labors with a glad persistence
worthy of large commendations
to erect his naval stations
man the universal simp
follows lagging with a limp
treading on his neighbors toes
the way the little insect goes
in a million years or more
man may learn the simple lore
of how the bees are organized
and why the ants are civilized
may even hope for to approach
the culture of an average roach
if he is humble and not smug
may emulate the tumble bug
for we insects now inherit
all humanity has builded
all they raised with brawn and spirit
all the domes and spires they gilded
time the anthropophagous
swallows down all human works
through his broad esophagus
moslems christians hindus turks
pass to their sarcophagus
leaving nothing much on earth
which even beetles find of worth
i mention nineveh and tyre
i cite the tower of babel
troy which fell into the fire
and sodom with its rabble
where are all the towns of siddim
where the kings of crete
long long since the desert hid em
and the spiders bite their feet
following an old convention
dating back to jeremiah
i might even mention
babylon i might enquire
where o where is babylon
and the echo answers where
for its former ruling wizards
sleep in sand and silicon
with gravel in their gizzards
and sand burrs in their hair
and the centipedes are dancing
in the chambers of the palace
where the kings and queens entrancing
used to quaff the ruby chalice
and proceed to their romancing
i look forward to the day
when the human race is done
and we insects romp and play
freely underneath the sun
and no roach paste is scattered
about anywhere i got another jolt of it
last night and today i seem to have a case
of intestinal flu the trouble with you
human beings is you are just plain wicked
archy
one of our prominent scientists got a good look at it
archy on the radio
dear boss
i hope you tuned in
last evening when mars and i
were on the radio together
our first joint appearance
in several years
do you realize said mars
that next week will be archy week
all over mars
and several other prominent planets
archy
good gracious mars it had slipped
my memory
mars
do you know that you are
our favorite author here and
we all but worship you
archy
well mars as far as that goes
you are one of my favorite planets
mars
what a coincidence
archy
the long arm of coincidence
makes many radio connections
mars
is that your own phrase archy
archy
mine until the next air program
nowadays an author owns his stuff
only between air programs
mars
did you know about the archy clubs here
archy
i hope they can t throw them this far
what do they look like
mars
like dumbbells ha ha ha
but please tell us how you happened
to start your career as a writer
archy
it did not happen it was something
i planned deliberately so i could quit
being what i was
mars
explain please the stars are listening
archy
well you see i was the four marx brothers
and it became annoying because
i quarrelled among myself all the time
so in order to end it all i turned
author writing dante s inferno and
mehitabel the cat
mars
what do you call that little planet
where you are at
archy
well now what do you call it
mars
we call it goofus
archy
goofus goofus why goofus
mars
not long ago one of our prominent
scientists got a good look at it
with a new fangled telescope and
he laughed himself to death crying out
goofus goofus goofus all the time
he said from the way it looked it couldn t
be named anything else but goofus
archy
well if that s the way you feel who was
that lady i seen you walking with last Sunday
mars
that wasn t no lady that was venus
is there any particular message
you would like to send your billions
and billions of admirers in these parts
archy
oh yes tell them
this hour is by the courtesy
of the knockem cold roach and bug killing company
and that i wish to testify
that their product has several times
brought me personally nearer the great adventure
than any other roach paste i ever ate
i always carry a flask of bath tub gin with me
as an antidote
mars
will you describe yourself for your
worshipers here
archy
i am over six feet and go everywhere
mars
who has influenced you most in a
literary way
archy
theodore dreiser and bernard shaw
they taught me how far an author can go
if he never loses patience with himself
mars
archy it is impossible that you should
not lose patience with yourself sometimes
archy
well i havent gone as far as they have either
mars
what are the conditions of life on your planet archy
archy
they practically dont exist any more
mars
but how do people get along
archy
the men make a living by talking
about how much they have lost
during the depression
and the women and children pick up
what they can by listening
how is it by yourself old timer
mars
we never had to do any work here
we get our living by biting electrons out of the air
which we crack with our teeth
and eat the kernels while we spit
the shells into space which accounts
for a lot of the static you hear
archy
that not only interests me as a scientist
but it seems much more refined than
working for a living
mars
yes it is refined all right but it is
expensive it runs into terrible dentists bills
archy
but dentists bills are always terrible
everywhere anyhow
mars
wait till i write that down please
do you have to think a long time
for those brilliant things
or do they just come to you
archy
i never think at all when i write
nobody can do two things at the same time
and do them both well
mars
are you starting any new literary movements on your planet
archy
oh yes the latest literary movement
consists in going to all the fences
and coal sheds near all the school houses
and copying off of them all the bad words
written there by naughty little boys
over the week ends
and these form the bases of the new novels
of course these novels are kept away
from the young so they will not be contaminated
mars
but where do the boys get the words
archy
from hired hands and the classics
archy
archy a low brow
boss i saw a picture
of myself in a paper
the other day
writing on a typewriter
with some of my feet
i wish it was as easy
as that what i have to do
is dive at each key
on the machine
and bump it with my head
and sometimes it telescopes
my occiput into my
vertebrae and i have a
permanent callous
on my forehead
i am in fact becoming
a low brow think of it
me with all my learning
to become a low brow
hoping that you
will remain the same
i am as ever your
faithful little bug
archy
mehitabel s parlor story
boss did you
hear about the two drunks
who were riding in
a ford or something
equally comic
and the ford or
whatever it was nearly
went off the
road one of
the drunks poked the
other and said thickly
they always talk thickly in
these stories
anyway he said hey look
out how youre driving
youll have us in
the ditch in a minute if
you dont look out
why said the second
drunk who was drunker
i thought you
were driving i got
that from mehitabel the
cat its the first parlor
story ive ever heard
her tell and ive known
her for five or six
years now
archy
archy s mission
well boss i am
going to quit living
a life of leisure
i have been an idler
and a waster and a
mere poet too long
my conscience has waked up
wish yours would do the same
i am going to have
a moral purpose in my life
hereafter and a cause
i am going to reclaim
cockroaches and teach them
proper ways of living
i am going to see if i cannot
reform insects in g
eneral
i have constituted
myself a missionary
extraordinary
and minister
plenipotentiary
and entomological
to bring idealism to
the little struggling brothers
the conditions in the insect
world today would shock
american reformers
if they knew about them
the lives they lead
are scarcely fit to print
i cannot go into
details but the contented
laxness in which i find
them is frightful
a family newspaper is no place
for these revelations
but i am trying to have
printed in paris
for limited circulation
amongst truly earnest
souls a volume which will
be entitled
the truth about the insects
i assure you there is nothing
even in the old testament
as terrible
i shall be the cotton mather
of the boll weevil
archy
you can fry fish on the sidewalk
archy visits washington
washington d c july
23 well boss here
i am in washington
watching my step for fear