Poetry Break: "Illegal"

Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Poetry Foundation

I've long liked Tennyson's sharp, concise poem "The Eagle":

The Eagle

He clasps the crag with crooked hands;
Close to the sun in lonely lands,
Ring'd with the azure world, he stands.

The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls;
He watches from his mountain walls,
And like a thunderbolt he falls.

But despite liking it, I want to contradict it with a parody, a "paradiction":

Illegal

He grasps the rag with crooked hands;
Closed to the sun in lonely lands,
Ring'd by an assured whirl, he stands.

The wrinkled skin upon him crawls;
He washes plates from mounting walls,
And like a blunderdolt he falls.

That'll likely raise the hackles of some sensitive souls, but I worked as a dishwasher for three years, and I've sometimes in my life had to support myself as an 'undocumented' laborer, so I've got street cred and can compose this sort of poem.

If I feel like it . . .