You may have heard of him;
At Woodlawn, he now sleeps.
He who lived among cannibals,
And only got a peep.
Nor up the lawn, nor at the woods
From no marble vault a sound.
But as he sleeps, perchance he dreams
Of water all around.
Get on the 4 before it's four,
Woodlawn will be your stop.
Get off and find gates open wide—
Head to Catalpa Plot.
Standing before a sculpted scroll,
A headstone that's just blank—
Unconquerable is this soul
And mind, which none could rank.
Rudyard Kipling said as follows:
"Take up the white man's burden,
Send forth the best ye men!"
Melville said much earlier, still:
"BLOODY BATTLE IN AFGHANISTAN."
These words he wrote some years ahead,
"Whaling voyage by one Ishmael,"
Who with Queequeg shared a bed, then
Boarding the Pequod, they set sail.
Now, if you say—before you've read
Anything he's written—,
"Oh, Melville, how he makes me sick!"
I'd tell you then: Go eat a Moby Dick.