THE poorhouse has no Persian rugs, no costly chandeliers; and there we'll dwell and chase the bugs in our declining years. On bread and meat and spuds and pie there's an unholy price; the cost of coal has gone so high the poor are burning ice. The butchers used to give away the liver of the cow; today they wrap it up and say, "Cough up a quarter now." The poorhouse has no movie stage, no joyous minstrel troupe; and there we'll spend our wintry age, and live on cabbage soup. When o'er the daily sheet we glance, we drop it with a frown; the price of everything's advanced, and nothing has gone down. The printer howls because his stock more precious is than gems; the tailor wets with tears the frock which drearily he hems. Man wears his sweater in his bed, because he has no shift, and cries aloud, while seeing red, "Oh, whither do we drift?" The poorhouse has no plutocrats, no closed or open cars; and there we'll dwell and swat the rats until we climb the stars. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE ASSAULT HEROIC by ROBERT RANKE GRAVES A CONSECRATION by JOHN MASEFIELD SPRING, 1916 by ISAAC ROSENBERG UPON A WASP CHILLED WITH COLD by EDWARD TAYLOR THE BROKEN FIELD by SARA TEASDALE STEADFASTNESS; THE LOVER BESEECHETH HIS MISTRESS by THOMAS WYATT |