On Mixed Pupils
On Mixed Pupils
Original Text
Arachnia, Occasional Verses (London: Macmillan, 1904: 42. Internet Archive.
1I wonder, to look on some commonplace
2 Crass carcase in calm cow-hide,
3What on earth, if one could see through the case,
4 The works are doing inside!
5Is he, as were some from his years (fifteen)
6 A fuming furnace fire,
7A darkness, and a flickering sheen,
8 A simmering sad desire?
9And scorns and sorrows and loves and pains
10 Are playing roulette within,
11And now it is Gabriel getting the gains,
12 And now 'tis Gehenna and sin?
13And will he be gutted and taken to bits
14 With pincers some day and cleaned,
15And a bright new spring be put into the thing
16 As fresh as the day he was weaned?
17Or shall he not rather gently detach,
18 And with easy careless pitch
19Make room (and be damned) for a new one to match,
20 Chucked into the nearest ditch?
RPO poem Editors
Ian Lancashire
Data entry: Sharine Leung
RPO Edition
2012
Rhyme
Form