Prosaic or poetic?

How I love to set up false dichotomies as a way of opening a discussion about something. This technique was the basis for almost every essay I wrote in my degree course: set up a straw man or woman, then use the Aunt Sally position you disagree with as a point of ridiculous reference while you argue your preferred case -- if you could find a pair of extremist quotations to use as epigrams, all the better. It seemed to work, though, as I 'done great' at university.

(Example: "The silent 'G' and 'P' in the title of Ted Hughes' poem Gnat Psalm are representative of all that is false, hollow, and empty in the universe, and echo the pointlessness and futility of the human condition. These paired letters encapsulate the superficiality and disposability of much that counts for civilisation, and elevate the gnats' brainless dance to the same level as all of our politics, art, and religion: all there is really is the sunlight, the coming dusk, and the inevitability of death after a brief, manic existence.")

Actually, I made that one up. But you get my drift.

Anyway. I'm listening to Tom Waits' blinding soundtrack for One from the Heart. In Broken Bicycles, Tom says:

September's reminding July,
It's time to be saying goodbye..."

I guess you could render that as:

It's August.

But I know which one I prefer: romanticisation and poetics every time.