# XXVII explained — Poetry

> Chapter companion for Poetry by Ambrose Bierce.

## What happens

An epitaph for Greer Harrison, a pretentious poet who aspired to Parnassian heights but lacked skill, now silenced in death, his talents returned to earth and his legacy reduced to dirt.

## Themes in this chapter

### Art and Criticism

The epitaph satirizes a poet who lacked genuine talent, critiquing the gap between artistic ambition and actual skill.

### Mortality and Regret

The poem reflects on death as the great leveler, reducing all pretensions to dust and ending any hope of artistic achievement.

## Character check-ins

### Greer Harrison

The subject of the epitaph, a poet of little skill who loved to loll on Parnassus but is now dead and buried.

### Fame

Personified as concluding the record of Greer Harrison's life with 'Dirt to dirt!'

## Key lines

> Here lies Greer Harrison, a well cracked louse⁠— So small a tenant of so big a house!

Greer Harrison is buried here, a worthless parasite who occupied a grand tomb.

_Opens the epitaph with a contemptuous comparison of Harrison to a louse in a large house._

> What poetry he’d written but for lack Of skill, when he had counted, to count back!

He would have written poetry if he had the ability to count backwards after counting forwards.

_Mocks Harrison's incompetence, suggesting he couldn't even perform basic arithmetic._

> The genius of his purse no longer draws The pleasing thunders of a paid applause.

His money can no longer buy the applause he once paid for.

_Highlights that his reputation was purchased, not earned through talent._

> All his no talents to the earth revert, And Fame concludes the record: 'Dirt to dirt!'

All his lack of abilities returns to the ground, and Fame sums up his life as 'dust to dust.'

_Final judgment that Harrison had no real talents, and his legacy is nothing._

## Links

- HTML: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/poetry_se/chapters/xxvii
- Book: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/poetry_se
- All chapters: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/poetry_se/chapters