Disclaimer: I do not own any of these characters, though no names are mentioned.
Author's Notes: A poem! Yes! This one's about the Boho's, cause I love those guys. Please review; it'll make my day.
This story's dedicated to TK, my twin sister, for all of her silly nonsense poems that inspired me to write this.
Mismatched Brothers
Ah, what a mismatched group are we
A leader and his followers three
Living in a garret small enough for a flea
A mismatched group are we
A dwarf with a lisp who's always painting
An Argentinean who's always fainting
A man whose own drinks he's constantly tainting
A musician who can hardly see
Scrounging for money, for something to eat
Cringing from daylight that floods through the street
Hiding upstairs till the nighttime so sweet
We lurk like mice or rats
While we look for any source of food
Begging for scraps to feed the brood
The rich and the snobbish consider us rude
When we forget to tip our hats
We live upstairs, at the top of the sky
Looking at Montmarte with an artists' eye
Our windows allow us to peer from on high
At the passersby below
'Revolutionists', we say, when the people inquire
As to why such a motley group would conspire
To live in a rat hole, and try to inspire
But we'll say 'you could never know'
Cans of paint are stacked here and there
Music is coming from God-knows-where
And there's always a drink for someone to prepare
In the garret that's in our keep
At three a.m., when 'the muse has hit'
The artist will wake, and the garret is lit
As he tries to capture this vision so fit
While his roommates attempt to sleep
And then, there's the songs pounded out on the keys
The off-notes, the chords, all as loud as you please
Swinging from tune to tune like he's on a trapeze
Like a little musical elf
The drinks and bottles all over the floor
Tell of an obsession and something more
He'll offer a drink as you come in the door
He's had quite enough himself
Of course, there's always the constant beat
Of a tango-dancers' stamping feet
As he moves 'round the garret, he says he's complete
When he's dancing the night away
Altogether, the place is always busy
As if it's inhabitants live in a tizzy
Full of absinthe and other things that are fizzy
But we're usually sober (we'll say)
On those nights when we make a trip to the club
We're always aware of the constant rub
That the richer folks give, like it's their job to snub
Any artists who're poorer than they
But we'll laugh and we'll smile like we haven't a care
(It bothers them greatly when we pretend they're not there)
We don't listen to them; they could just be thin air
We have a good time and we play
On those nights when we go to that place of romances
The drunkard gets drunk, and the tango-man dances
While the artist and musician are getting strange glances
For singing along with the tune
Then we'll all wander back to our lair up above
Talking and singing the praises of
Beauty, freedom, truth, and love
And we all sleep in till noon
We're poorer than mice, and we're frowned on by many
But though we may not have a franc or a penny
We have something better, far better than any
Treasure like diamonds or pearl
We have our brothers, all willing to fight
To stand up for what we believe is right
To show all the people Bohemian might
And that is worth all the world
Ah, what a mismatched group are we
All struggling artists, but all of us free
Free to be anyone we want to be
Mismatched brothers are we
~ The End