The thesaurus is an insidious companion;
To take so reputable a guide to roads
On gradients that steepen into goads
Is to walk in a park but perish in a canyon.
Towards what nuance, what sheer synonymous rift
Will he be driven, the ravaged scholar?
Beyond each entry looms another cliff —
Another word — the range of the enthraller.
Some treacherous outcrop he will have climbed —
The hunter, the poet — trapped in a fastness
Of his own approach, some ramifying blind
That seemed at first bold steppe, a satisfying vastness.