Epitaph on a Tyrant
- Written by: Amy Frykholm
Published: 0 November 2026
W.H. Auden (1907–1973)
Epitaph on a Tyrant
Perfection, of a kind, was what he was after
And the poetry he invented was easy to understand;
He knew human folly like the back of his hand,
And was greatly interested in armies and fleets;
When he laughed, respectable senators burst with laughter,
And when he cried the little children died in the streets.
W.H. Auden (1907–1973) was a British-American poet, essayist, and playwright who won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for his 1947 long poem The Age of Anxiety. Joseph Brodsky lauded Auden as having "the greatest mind of the twentieth century."
Selected by Amy Frykholm: amy@journeywithjesus.net
