When you've come to make a fortune and you haven't made your salt, <br />And the reason of your failure isn't anybody's fault - <br />When you haven't got a billet, and the times are very slack, <br />There is nothing that can spur you like the shame of going back; <br />Crawling home with empty pockets, <br />Going back hard-up; <br />Oh! it's then you learn the meaning of humiliation's cup. <br /> <br />When the place and you are strangers and you struggle all alone, <br />And you have a mighty longing for the town where you are known; <br />When your clothes are very shabby and the future's very black, <br />There is nothing that can hurt you like the shame of going back. <br /> <br />When we've fought the battle bravely and are beaten to the wall, <br />'Tis the sneers of men, not conscience, that make cowards of us all; <br />And the while you are returning, oh! your brain is on the rack, <br />And your heart is in the shadow of the shame of going back. <br /> <br />When a beaten man's discovered with a bullet in his brain, <br />They POST-MORTEM him, and try him, and they say he was insane; <br />But it very often happens that he'd lately got the sack, <br />And his onward move was owing to the shame of going back. <br /> <br />Ah! my friend, you call it nonsense, and your upper lip is curled, <br />I can see that you have never worked your passage through the world; <br />But when fortune rounds upon you and the rain is on the track, <br />You will learn the bitter meaning of the shame of going back; <br />Going home with empty pockets, <br />Going home hard-up; <br />Oh, you'll taste the bitter poison in humiliation's cup.<br /><br />Henry Lawson<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-shame-of-going-back/
