Rich or Poor

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1. Poor Poet ‘A man should write to please himself,’ He proudly said. Well, see his poems on the shelf, Dusty, unread. When he came to my shop each day, So peaked and cold, I’d sneak one of his books away And say ’twas sold. And then by chance he looked below, And saw a stack Of his […]...
2. The Rich Boy's Christmas And now behold this sulking boy, His costly presents bring no joy; Harsh tears of anger fill his eye Tho’ he has all that wealth can buy. What profits it that he employs His many gifts to make a noise? His playroom is so placed that he Can cause his folks no agony. MORAL: Mere […]...
3. Sonnet XXIV: Rich Fools There Be Rich fools there be, whose base and filthy heart Lies hatching still the goods wherein they flow: And damning their own selves to Tantal’s smart, Wealth breeding want, more blist more wretched grow. Yet to those fools heav’n such wit doth impart As what their hands do hold, their heads do know, And knowing love, […]...
4. Rich Days Welcome to you rich Autumn days, Ere comes the cold, leaf-picking wind; When golden stocks are seen in fields, All standing arm-in-arm entwined; And gallons of sweet cider seen On trees in apples red and green. With mellow pears that cheat our teeth, Which melt that tongues may suck them in; With blue-black damsons, yellow […]...
5. Prudence is a rich ugly old maid courted by incapacity (blake proverb) prudence my love Each time you invite me to tea I wonder do i have the appetite For what i Hope you are requiring of me Prudence my love Are you really trying to say Over the sickly cream cakes I can’t eat That you desire me to stay Prudence my love What can i […]...
6. A Mine there is no Man would own A Mine there is no Man would own But must it be conferred, Demeaning by exclusive wealth A Universe beside Potosi never to be spent But hoarded in the mind What Misers wring their hands tonight For Indies in the Ground!...
7. Rich and Rare Were the Gems She Wore Rich and rare were the gems she wore, And a bright gold ring on her wand she bore; But oh! her beauty was far beyond Her sparkling gems, or snow-white wand. “Lady! dost thou not fear to stray, So lone and lovely through this bleak way? Are Erin’s sons so good or so cold, As […]...
8. Poor Marguerite Swift, o’er the wild and dreary waste A NUT-BROWN GIRL was seen to haste; Wide waving was her unbound hair, And sun-scorch’d was her bosom bare; For Summer’s noon had shed its beams While she lay wrapp’d in fev’rish dreams; While, on the wither’d hedge-row’s side, By turns she slept, by turns she cried, “Ah! […]...
9. Poor Devil! Well, I was tired of life; the silly folk, The tiresome noises, all the common things I loved once, crushed me with an iron yoke. I longed for the cool quiet and the dark, Under the common sod where louts and kings Lie down, serene, unheeding, careless, stark, Never to rise or move or feel […]...
10. Poor Cock Robin My garden robin in the Spring Was rapturous with glee, And followed me with wistful wing From pear to apple tree; His melodies the summer long He carolled with delight, As if he could with jewelled song Find favour in my sight. And now that Autumn’s in the air He’s singing singing still, And yet […]...
11. Once there came a man Once there came a man Who said, “Range me all men of the world in rows.” And instantly There was terrific clamour among the people Against being ranged in rows. There was a loud quarrel, world-wide. It endured for ages; And blood was shed By those who would not stand in rows, And by those […]...
12. The Poor Singing Dame Beneath an old wall, that went round an old Castle, For many a year, with brown ivy o’erspread; A neat little Hovel, its lowly roof raising, Defied the wild winds that howl’d over its shed: The turrets, that frown’d on the poor simple dwelling, Were rock’d to and fro, when the Tempest would roar, And […]...
13. The Poor Children Take heed of this small child of earth; He is great; he hath in him God most high. Children before their fleshly birth Are lights alive in the blue sky. In our light bitter world of wrong They come; God gives us them awhile. His speech is in their stammering tongue, And his forgiveness in […]...
14. Poor Kid Mumsie and Dad are raven dark And I am lily blonde. ”Tis strange,’ I once heard nurse remark, ‘You do not correspond.’ And yet they claim me as their own, Born of their flesh and bone. To doubt their parenthood I dread, But now to girlhood grown, The thought is haunting in my head That […]...
15. The Poor Man's Lamb NOW spent the alter’d King, in am’rous Cares, The Hours of sacred Hymns and solemn Pray’rs: In vain the Alter waits his slow returns, Where unattended Incense faintly burns: In vain the whisp’ring Priests their Fears express, And of the Change a thousand Causes guess. Heedless of all their Censures He retires, And in his […]...
16. Bank Robber I much admire, I must admit, The man who robs a Bank; It takes a lot of guts and grit, For lack of which I thank The gods: a chap ‘twould make of me You wouldn’t ask to tea. I do not mean a burglar cove Who climbs into a house, From room to room […]...
17. The Old Prison The rows of cells are unroofed, A flute for the wind’s mouth, Who comes with a breath of ice From the blue caves of the south. O dark and fierce day: The wind like an angry bee Hunts for the black honey In the pits of the hollow sea. Waves of shadow wash The empty […]...
18. To Rich Givers WHAT you give me, I cheerfully accept, A little sustenance, a hut and garden, a little money-these, as I rendezvous with my poems; A traveler’s lodging and breakfast as I journey through The States-Why should I be ashamed to own such gifts? Why to advertise for them? For I myself am not one who bestows […]...
19. Sonnet 52: So am I as the rich whose blessèd key So am I as the rich whose blessèd key Can bring him to his sweet up-lockèd treasure, The which he will not every hour survey, For blunting the fine point of seldom pleasure. Therefore are feasts so solemn and so rare, Since, seldom coming, in that long year set, Like stones of worth they thinly […]...
20. A Door just opened on a street A Door just opened on a street I lost was passing by An instant’s Width of Warmth disclosed And Wealth and Company. The Door as instant shut And I I lost was passing by Lost doubly but by contrast most Informing misery...
21. For the Poor When Hagar found the bottle spent And wept o’er Ishmael, A message from the Lord was sent To guide her to a well. Should not Elijah’s cake and cruse Convince us at this day, A gracious God will not refuse Provisions by the way? His saints and servants shall be fed, The promise is secure; […]...
22. When Gassy Thompson Struck It Rich He paid a Swede twelve bits an hour Just to invent a fancy style To spread the celebration paint So it would show at least a mile. Some things they did I will not tell. They’re not quite proper for a rhyme. But I will say Yim Yonson Swede Did sure invent a sunflower time. […]...
23. O Poor People Let us invoke a healthy heart-breaking Towards the horrible world: Let us say 0 poor people How can they help being so absurd, Misguided, abused, misled? With unsifted saving graces jostling about On a mucky medley of needs, Like love-lit shit, Year after cyclic year The unidentifiable flying god is missed. Emotions sit in their […]...
24. Curse of a Rich Polish Peasant on His Sister Who Ran Away With a Wild Man FELIKSOWA has gone again from our house and this time for good, I hope. She and her husband took with them the cow father gave them, and they sold it. She went like a swine, because she called neither on me, her brother, nor on her father, before leaving for those forests. That is where […]...
25. On Retirement A HERMIT’S house beside a stream With forests planted round, Whatever it to you may seem More real happiness I deem Than if I were a monarch crowned. A cottage I could call my own Remote from domes of care; A little garden, walled with stone, The wall with ivy overgrown, A limpid fountain near, […]...
26. Tezcotzinco Though thou art now a ruin bare and cold, Thou wert sometime the garden of a king. The birds have sought a lovelier place to sing. The flowers are few. It was not so of old. It was not thus when hand in hand there strolled Through arbors perfumed with undying Spring Bare bodies beautiful, […]...
27. The Lovers of the Poor arrive. The Ladies from the Ladies’ Betterment League Arrive in the afternoon, the late light slanting In diluted gold bars across the boulevard brag Of proud, seamed faces with mercy and murder hinting Here, there, interrupting, all deep and debonair, The pink paint on the innocence of fear; Walk in a gingerly manner up the […]...
28. The Boat I must launch out my boat. The languid hours pass by on the Shore – Alas for me! The spring has done its flowering and taken leave. And now with the burden of faded futile flowers I wait and linger. The waves have become clamorous, and upon the bank in the shady lane The yellow […]...
29. The Yellow Violet When beechen buds begin to swell, And woods the blue-bird’s warble know, The yellow violet’s modest bell Peeps from last-year’s leaves below. Ere russet fields their green resume, Sweet flower, I love, in forest bare, To meet thee, when thy faint perfume Alone is in the virgin air. Of all her train, the hands of […]...
30. To A Poor Old Woman munching a plum on The street a paper bag Of them in her hand They taste good to her They taste good To her. They taste Good to her You can see it by The way she gives herself To the one half Sucked out in her hand Comforted A solace of ripe plums Seeming […]...
31. Poor Honest Men Your jar of Virginny Will cost you a guinea, Which you reckon too much by five shillings or ten; But light your churchwarden And judge it according, When I’ve told you the troubles of poor honest men. From the Capes of the Delaware, As you are well aware, We sail which tobacco for England-but then, […]...
32. The Joy Of Being Poor I Let others sing of gold and gear, the joy of being rich; But oh, the days when I was poor, a vagrant in a ditch! When every dawn was like a gem, so radiant and rare, And I had but a single coat, and not a single care; When I would feast right royally […]...
33. Poor little Heart! Poor little Heart! Did they forget thee? Then dinna care! Then dinna care! Proud little Heart! Did they forsake thee? Be debonnaire! Be debonnaire! Frail little Heart! I would not break thee Could’st credit me? Could’st credit me? Gay little Heart Like Morning Glory! Wind and Sun wilt thee array!...
34. Poor Earth It is not heaven: bitter seed Leavens its entrails with despair It is a star where dragons breed: Devils have a footing there. The sky has bent it out of shape; The sun has strapped it to his wheel; Its course is crooked to escape Traps and gins of stone and steel. It balances on […]...
35. The Poor Old Cannon Upbroke the sun In red-gold foam; Thus spoke the gun At the Soldier’s Home: “Whenever I hear Blue thunder speak My voice sounds clear But little and weak. “And when the proud Young cockerels crow My voice sounds loud, But gentle and low. “When the mocking-bird Prolongs his note I cannot be heard Though I […]...
36. SONNET OF AUTUMN THEY say to me, thy clear and crystal eyes: “Why dost thou love me so, strange lover mine?” Be sweet, be still! My heart and soul despise All save that antique brute-like faith of thine; And will not bare the secret of their shame To thee whose hand soothes me to slumbers long, Nor their […]...
37. Poor Peter Blind Peter Piper used to play All up and down the city; I’d often meet him on my way, And throw a coin for pity. But all amid his sparkling tones His ear was quick as any To catch upon the cobble-stones The jingle of my penny. And as upon a day that shone He […]...
38. The Poor Boy's Christmas Observe, my child, this pretty scene, And note the air of pleasure keen With which the widow’s orphan boy Toots his tin horn, his only toy. What need of costly gifts has he? The widow has nowhere to flee. And ample noise his horn emits To drive the widow into fits. MORAL: The philosophic mind […]...
39. The Poor Relation No longer torn by what she knows And sees within the eyes of others, Her doubts are when the daylight goes, Her fears are for the few she bothers. She tells them it is wholly wrong Of her to stay alive so long; And when she smiles her forehead shows A crinkle that had been […]...
40. 28. Poor Mailie's Elegy LAMENT in rhyme, lament in prose, Wi’ saut tears trickling down your nose; Our bardie’s fate is at a close, Past a’ remead! The last, sad cape-stane o’ his woes; Poor Mailie’s dead! It’s no the loss o’ warl’s gear, That could sae bitter draw the tear, Or mak our bardie, dowie, wear The mourning […]...