A Rowdy Audience

Words remember the row where they were sitting;
They chatter at each other during the performance,
Rude and uncouth, though readers delight in the torments;

And paging through, the spectators listen unwitting
To images while an old spontaneous crowd
Surrounds the bystander silently out loud.

That woman over there, the feminine noun,
Is laughing in a manner truly obnoxious
Which makes the grammarian wince as he unlocks his
Case for a simple predicate now compóund.

There’s no one to teach good manners to allusions
That shout, that clamor though the lights have dimmed;
And jokes stand up and lurch with their intrusions
Against expostulators of doom and whim.