I love
 
the word beauty
                 and the beauty
adduced from it,
             its italy and egypt    
of enumerated sins.

In school
       I studied mathematics,
wherein two cows
            with glaucous eyes
are sent to measure
            the bride’s nobility
 
their broomstick smelling
                 of urine and rice.

He was the sort of poet   
       who said to his beloved
you stay in bed and I’ll
                go get some eggs
for twenty years
               he has been getting eggs

I’ve gotten used to asking
        an egg of the cow

waiting for him the bed still warm
 

Robert Conquest: Garland for a Propagandist