Gross, with protruding ears, <br />Sleek hair, brisk glance, fleshy and yet alert, <br />Red, full, and satisfied, <br />Cased in obtuseness confident not to be hurt, <br /> <br />He sits at a little table <br />In the crowded congenial glare and noise, jingling <br />Coin in his pocket; sips <br />His glass, with hard eye impudently singling <br /> <br />A woman here and there: — <br />Women and men, they are all priced in his thought, <br />All commodities staked <br />In the market, sooner or later sold and bought. <br /> <br />'Were I he,' you are thinking, <br />You with the dreamer's forehead and pure eyes, <br />'What should I lose? — All, <br />All that is worthy the striving for, all my prize, <br /> <br />'All the truth of me, all <br />Life that is wonder, pity, and fear, requiring <br />Utter joy, utter pain, <br />From the heart that the infinite hurts with deep desiring <br /> <br />'Why is it I am not he? <br />Chance? The grace of God? The mystery's plan? <br />He, too, is human stuff, <br />A kneading of the old, brotherly slime of man. <br /> <br />'Am I a lover of men, <br />And turn abhorring as from fat slug or snake? <br />Lives obstinate in me too <br />Something the power of angels could not unmake?' <br /> <br />O self-questioner! None <br />Unlocks your answer. Steadily look, nor flinch. <br />This belongs to your kind, <br />And knows its aim and fails not itself at a pinch. <br /> <br />It is here in the world and works, <br />Not done with yet. — Up, then, let the test be tried! <br />Dare your uttermost, be <br />Completely, and of your own, like him, be justified.<br /><br />Robert Laurence Binyon<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/commercial-2/
