’Tis poverty cuts like a butcher’s knife,
And the stabs of the butcher rankle long—
Say are you, at most,
Like a chap on toast,
Held over the fire on the toaster’s prong?
The prizes are not for the swift alone:
There’s small demand on your brawn or brain:
Just a cast-steel chiv, and a hunk of stone,
And a thirst that can cut and come again—
A trifle of salt,