As a beaked nose, Joyce’s
people are rapacious
to consume their choices.
Fascination with death,
a strong-brewed variant
of all Dubliners’ breath,
keeps that first boy intent
on life. They never flag,
their concerns are their own,
old and young, they will brag, —
only at last one’s shown
beyond the iron gates’
concentrating power
and sees all loves and hates
as frail as a flower.