Desperate Words

From sea to sagebrush,
opulence to Ozymandias,
majesty to mockery;
from all-pervading storm to placid summer,
contemplative renaissance to intellectual trenches,
warm sun to hot black hole;
from Keats to Captain Killgore,
dizziness to mastery,
bull-like lust to wolfish aloofness;
from penitent grief to profitable practicality,
melodic enchantment to discordant disease,
frantic grace to calm confusion;
from the energetic ambition of youth to the weathered wisdom of fifty,
barely living seed to leafy bourgeois,
desperate words to celebrated tome.