Dialogue on realities, mangled and grim vs. poetry

In the last episode of the series (August 1853), Frank again proves himself the Mohi of "Scenes Beyond the Western Border." A fictional character in Melville's Mardi, Mohi a.k.a. Braid-Beard is the historian who explores strange islands in company with the narrator Taji, King Media, Babbalanja the philosopher and Yoomy the youthful minstrel. The previous Dragooned post on being sung/talked to sleep showed Frank's criticizing the writing-in-progress by the narrator, like Mohi's criticizing the song of Yoomy right after its performance. Mohi says he wants what Frank "luxuriously" gets in being put to sleep by the narrative performance of a traveling companion. All that happened in the September 1852 and March 1853 installments of what is supposed to be the 1845 journal of the actual historical march by U. S. Dragoons to the Rocky Mountains and back. (6:10--Remember Alice? This is a song about Alice.) The final August 1853 installment features an extended dialogue on narrative aesthetics, with a strong claim by the narrator for the deeper aesthetic and spiritual truths of poetry over the merely factual depiction of "grim realities." Aiming to please Frank by writing of "grim realities," the narrator found "a little vein" of poetry anyhow. Frank certainly would have preferred "grim realities" if the narrator could only have managed a plain, "simple narrative" of facts. Likewise Melville's Mohi favors, in the words of Yoomy, "mangled realities" over imaginative fictions.

Upon this presumptuous interference, Mohi looked highly offended; and nervously twitching his beard, uttered something invidious about frippery young poetasters being too full of silly imaginings to tell a plain tale. 

Said Yoomy, in reply, adjusting his turban, “ Old Mohi, let us not clash. I honor your calling; but, with submission, your chronicles are more wild than my cantos. I deal in pure conceits of my own; which have a shapeliness and a unity, however unsubstantial; but you, Braid Beard, deal in mangled realities. In all your chapters, you yourself grope in the dark. Much truth is not in thee, historian. --Mardi; and a voyage thither vol. 1

C.—"Ah! no bantering now—there is a dreamy art of more pretension still;—that would paint the heart;—that would fix the wandering thought;—that would delve for discoveries in the deep mine of man's nature! 

"But I have been writing, Frank, something for your especial approval; I have been setting forth grim realities,—and most philosophically. I did strike at last, but most naturally and truly, a little vein of—" 

F.—"—Poetry, perhaps? by the merest accident in the world." 

C.—"Nature is poetry! For what are sunsets often gorgeously beautiful, or delicately lovely, beyond all representation? For what, the endless variety, the exquisite combination of resplendent colours, of tints and hues of beauty in flowers and birds? Not for utility, Frank, but to soften our hearts—to refine and elevate our thoughts. Poetry is Worship!" 

F.—" Well, let me hear your specimen of 'grim reality.' If you could only realize the charm of simplicity! [1857 version gives the word "simplicity" in italics for added emphasis, thus: "That you could only realize the charm of simplicity!"] For poetry I generally go to Job, David, or Isaiah." 

I read to him my day's experiences. He listened impatiently; and at last broke out— "You are incorrigible! Do you call that abstraction, the real?" 

C.—"Surely it has a mournfully same, and daily reality!" 

F.—" And how easily by a mere turn of expression, you could have given it the interest of a simple narrative!" 

C.—"Well, I'm too indolent; for, if commenced, I might imagine myself bound to keep it up; and I scribble by no rule, and with no object but pastime; and, to compare in some future day the old with the new tone of mind." 

F.—" And a rather singular acquaintance will the old gentleman make! Pray why then did you trouble yourself with the dry abstract of our daily doings?" 

C.—" Thank-ye for solving—in your complimentary way—a question of my own! I will tell you: I am convinced that written descriptions, not only from carelessness or design, but from inherent imperfection, invariably paint very feebly; and from consciousness of this, are dashed with discoloured exaggerations; they deceive more than they enlighten the imaginations of those who are unable to apply the convictions and the tests of some experience; you perceive, then, that I was experimenting?" --August 1853 Scenes Beyond the Western Border; and Scenes and Adventures in the Army

Not least among the mind-bending contents of this meta-fictional dialogue about how to write is the uncredited source of the "little vein" of poetry struck by the narrator: Thou Lovest Me No More by Mattie Griffith.