Tempers Aren't Tempers Any More--or Are They?

Where, oh, where are the old-fashioned
Triple-action teeth gnashers,
The jump-triggered, hot, impassioned
Cane and umbrella bashers,
The camera smashers?

Where, for that matter, are the crabbed, crusty
Curmudgeonish cranks, shouting
“Liar, sir, liar!” — reaching for trusty
Shillelaghs, horsewhips, never doubting
Who was for knouting?

Where, I ask you, is a reasonable reason
For this reasonableness? Psychiatry
May hold the answer in this pallid season
Of analyses for all and sundry. They go quietly
Who once went riotly.

Overcompensated knuckleheads, mumdolts, et cetera —
A plague on all such! A vast
And purply-poisonous plague, or better a
Drumfire from howitzers massed —
Blast!, ! ! * # ⋆ ! ! , BLAST!