Vex not thou the banker's mind <br />(His what?) with a show of sense, <br />Vex it not, Willie, his mind, <br />Or pierce its pretence <br />On the supposition that it ever <br />Was other, or that this cheerful giver <br />Will give, save to the blind. <br /> <br />Come not anear the dark-browed sophist <br />Who on the so well-paid ground <br />Will cheerfully tell you a fist is no fist, <br />Come not here <br />With 2 and 2 making 4 in reason, <br />Knowest thou not the truth is never in season <br />In these quarters or Fleet St.? <br /> <br />In his eye there is death, I mean the banker's, <br />In his purse there is deceit, <br />It is he who buys gold-braid for the swankers <br />And gives you Australian iced rabbits' meat <br />In place of the roast beef of Britain, <br />And leaves you a park bench to sit on <br />If you git off the Embankment. <br /> <br />This is the kind of tone and Solemnity <br />That used to be used on the young, <br />My old man got no indemnity <br />But he swaller'd his tongue. <br />Like all his class was told to hold it in those days, <br />To mind their ‘p’s’ and their ‘q’s’ and their ways <br />An' be thankful for occasional holidays. <br /> <br />I don't quite see the joke any more, <br />Or why we should stand to attention <br />And lick the dirt off the floor <br />In the hope of honourable mention <br />From a great employer like Selfridge <br />Or a buyer of space in the papers. <br />I'm getting too old for such capers.<br /><br />Ezra Pound<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/alf-s-eighth-bit/
