Something Else - Paul Muldoon

When your lobster was lifted out of the tank
to be weighed
I thought of woad,
of madders, of fugitive, indigo inks,
of how Nerval
was given to promenade
a lobster on a gossamer thread,
how, when a decent interval
had passed
(son front rouge encor du baiser de la reine)
and his hopes of Adrienne
proved false,
he hanged himself from a lamp-post
with a length of chain, which made me think
of something else, then something else again.