Written by
Robert William Service |
Because I have ten thousand pounds I sit upon my stern,
And leave my living tranquilly for other folks to earn.
For in some procreative way that isn't very clear,
Ten thousand pounds will breed, they say, five hundred every year.
So as I have a healthy hate of economic strife,
I mean to stand aloof from it the balance of my life.
And yet with sympathy I see the grimy son of toil,
And heartly congratulate the tiller of the soil.
I like the miner in the mine, the sailor on the sea,
Because up to five hundred pounds they sail and mine for me.
For me their toil is taxed unto that annual extent,
According to the holy shibboleth of Five-per-Cent.
So get ten thousand pounds, my friend, in any way you can.
And leave your future welfare to the noble Working Man.
He'll buy you suits of Harris tweed, an Airedale and a car;
Your golf clubs and your morning Times, your whisky and cigar.
He'll cosily install you in a cottage by a stream,
With every modern comfort, and a garden that's a dream>
Or if your tastes be urban, he'll provide you with a flat,
Secluded from the clamour of the proletariat.
With pictures, music, easy chairs, a table of good cheer,
A chap can manage nicely on five hundred pounds a year.
And though around you painful signs of industry you view,
Why should you work when you can make your money work for you?
So I'll get down upon my knees and bless the Working Man,
Who offers me a life of ease through all my mortal span;
Whose loins are lean to make me fat, who slaves to keep me free,
Who dies before his prime to let me round the century;
Whose wife and children toil in urn until their strength is spent,
That I may live in idleness upon my five-per-cent.
And if at times they curse me, why should I feel any blame?
For in my place I know that they would do the very same.
Aye, though hey hoist a flag that's red on Sunday afternoon,
Just offer them ten thousand pounds and see them change their tune.
So I'll enjoy my dividends and live my life with zest,
And bless the mighty men who first - invented Interest.
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Written by
William Butler Yeats |
There where the course is,
Delight makes all of the one mind,
The riders upon the galloping horses,
The crowd that closes in behind:
We, too, had good attendance once,
Hearers and hearteners of the work;
Aye, horsemen for companions,
Before the merchant and the clerk
Breathed on the world with timid breath.
Sing on: somewhere at some new moon,
We'll learn that sleeping is not death,
Hearing the whole earth change its tune,
Its flesh being wild, and it again
Crying aloud as the racecourse is,
And we find hearteners among men
That ride upon horses.
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Written by
Rabindranath Tagore |
You left me and went on your way.
I thought I should mourn for you
and set your solitary image in my
heart wrought in a golden song.
But ah, my evil fortune, time is
short.
Youth wanes year after year; the
spring days are fugitive; the frail
flowers die for nothing, and the wise
man warns me that life is but a
dewdrop on the lotus leaf.
Should I neglect all this to gaze after
one who has turned her back on me?
That would be rude and foolish,
for time is short.
Then, come, my rainy nights with
pattering feet; smile, my golden
autumn; come, careless April, scatter-
ing your kisses abroad.
You come, and you, and you also!
My loves, you know we are mortals.
Is it wise to break one's heart for the
one who takes her heart away? For
time is short.
It is sweet to sit in a corner to muse
and write in rhymes that you are all
my world.
It is heroic to hug one's sorrow and
determine not to be consoled.
But a fresh face peeps across my
door and raise its eyes to my eyes.
I cannot but wipe away my tears
and change the tune of my song.
For time is short.
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