W. H. Auden is my Harry Potter,
A quintessentially British phenomenon
That makes me all American fanboy.

The impenetrability of the early verse,
The effervescence of the later --
Plainspoken and prolix, scholarly and simple.

If Marianne Moore had married Cole Porter
And given life to a gay and proper Anglican
With a facility for every kind of metre,

The offspring might have been Wystan Auden:
Verse more elegant than a Scarlatti sonata,
Odes more potent than a Bombay martini,

Acrobatic alcaics, sinewy Sapphics,
And naughty haiku. Bless his cheerful ghost!