The new masters paint a subject as they please,  
  And Veronese is prosecuted by the Inquisition  
  For the dogs playing at the feet of Christ,  
  The earth is a planet among galaxies.  
  Later Christ disappears, the dogs disappear: in abstract  
  Understanding, without adoration, the last master puts  
  Colors on canvas, a picture of the universe  
  In which a bright spot somewhere in the corner  
  Is the small radioactive planet men called Earth.
"The Old and the New Masters," lines 53-61 - The Lost World (1965)























