The poem
Is it because I'm bent and grey, Though wearing rather well, That I can slickly get away With all the yarns I tell? Is it because my bleary eye No longer beams with youth That I can plant a whopping lie, And flout the truth?
I wonder why folks hark to me Where once they would have laughed? They treat my yarns respectfully, No matter how they're daft. They count the notches on my gun And stroke its polished butt, Wanting to know why every one Of them was cut.
Indeed were I to stick to fact Their interest would flag; Dramatically I must act The rôle of scalliwag; A battle veteran to be, A frozen argonaut, A castaway in coral sea,-- Such a tommyrot!
And so with unction I conceive Invention wild and new, Until I'm coming to believe My taradiddles true . . . Is it because I'm old and sage, I draw a bow that's risky? Or can it be--that lies with age Improve like whisky?