Judge

The old judge with his wig askew,
his teeth worn into a crooked line,
tilting the contrary way to his sardonic smile,
and the eyes of a superannuated basset-hound,
dewlapped by tedium and due process —
even he will be sad to see the kobolds go.
He wishes he had a few round the house —
they'd come in handy: fixing things up,
keeping the place bright, breakfast with a song…
But they belong in their native habitat —
even he can see that. Besides,
he's already got one in the garden.
At the end he nods, beams, quite unlike
himself, shakes each of them by the hand
as if the world were, for those few moments,
a more wholesome place. In his dreams
that night he is playing a piano-accordion
made of dwarfs. The sound is dreadful.
An odd business! This no doubt means
he needs more cognac in his Milo.