The standard line on this fellow is that he’s “refusing to listen to the word of God,” but since he lives on the highest point of a town that thrives on nonsense and noise, I imagine something else has got him all worked up.

TANTUM DIC VERBO

For peace, be still—and let me chase
One paltry prayer unforesworn:
Is grace alone in silence born,
Or else is silence born in grace?

Your craws, your pealings, plaints, and croaks
Resolve my riddle not; you claim
I hearken not? Then whet your blame
On yeas and yawps, whose wasting chokes,

Excruciates, my aching ear,
Be still—the prate of grating chords
Reproves me not, your feint rewards
Me not—and yet I hear, and hear,

And hear, though to the gargling round
My riddles read as coarse complaints:
“Avenge, O Lord, thy slaughter’d saints,”
They canter, lest my quest confound

The noise that lauds their long regret.
I plead you, peace—and beg your fray
Be still, and in your silence pray
For grace, to bear my silence yet.

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