Posey Pens Farewell To U. T.’s ‘Lone Goth’

M .N. Posey, for ten years an instructor in the Department of English of the University, was perhaps the first to place the falling of Old Main into verse. Mr. Posey recently announced that he is leaving the University for East Carolina Teachers College, Greenville, N. C., where he has accepted a position. His work in the Southeast will begin next fall.

While at the University Mr. Posey has gained a reputation as a poet. He has been judge in verse writing contests, and he himself has won prizes. His "On Deconstruction of the Main Building" drew much comment from both critics and interested ex-students. The poem follows:

Lone Goth, stalwart, crowded, towering, still in mellow strength undaunted.

Giant of earlier days, strong in thew and sinew,

Age creeps on you, ivy-tendrilled,

Age your headsman axe.

Dust of ages long ago clings about you now at last.

You have marched thus far with time, but—

Death awaits you!

Tall-spired building snatched from a fire-doomed fall,

Silent—no bells ring, wires are dumb, the steam is off, the rooms are cold, not a window blinks with light.

You were not made for pavement, patches, and parterres.

Vastness and bluebonnet vista were yours,

The past you served, your vision ever forward,

You die and serve the future so; your death—

A birth and a memory!

Killers come to you with bars and hammers;

They pry, loosen, and throw.

Soon half will be gone, soon all.

Do you hear them chanting their Greek and Latin lore?

Are your mourners only the ghosts of ages gone?

That steam shovel shrieking and grunting is digging your grave—proudly descend.

Old Main

Back to News