We have our dreams; not happiness.
Great cities are upon the hill
To lighten all our dream, and still
We have no cities to possess
But cities built of bitterness.
We see gay fellows top to toe,
And girls in rainbow beauty bright—
’Tis but of silly dreams I write,
For up and down the streets we know,
The scavengers and harlots go.
Give me a dozen men whose theme
Is honesty, and we will set
On high the banner of dreams ... and yet
Thousands will pass us in a stream,
Nor care a penny what we dream.
RESPONSIBILITY
You ploughmen at the gate,
All that you are for me
Is of my mind create,
And in my brain to be
A figure newly won
From the world’s confusion.
And if you are of grace,
That’s honesty for me,
And if of evil face,
Recorded then shall be
Dishonour that I saw
Not beauty, but the flaw.
PROVOCATIONS
I am no merry monger when
I see the slatterns of the town:
I hate to think of docile men
Whose angers all are driven down;
For sluts make joy a thing obscene,
And in contempt is nothing clean.