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Tis vain for present fame to wish--
Our persons first must be forgotten;
For poets are like stinking fish--
They never shine until they're rotten.
--
The Elixir of Moonshine (1820).

 

McDonald Clarke

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Yes, God forgives and men forget,
And you're forgiven and forgotten.
You might be gaily sinning yet
And quick and fresh instead of rotten.
And when you think of love and fame
And all that might have come to pass,
Then don't you feel a little shame?
And don't you think you were an ass?

 

Joyce Kilmer

 

Beware of privilege. It stinks of rotten rotten fish heads, many of which were lapping the shore beneath the jetties.

 

Ralph Steadman

 

In Heraclitus' river
a fish has imagined the fish of all fish,
a fish kneels to the fish, a fish sings to the fish,
a fish begs the fish to ease its fishy lot.

 

Wislawa Szymborska

 

The king is gone
But he's not forgotten.
This is the story
Of a Johnny Rotten
It's better to burn out
Than it is to rust.
The king is gone
But he's not forgotten.

 

Neil Young

 

And one false step entirely damns her fame.
In vain with tears the loss she may deplore,
In vain look back on what she was before;
She sets like stars that fall, to rise no more.

 

Nicholas Rowe