'A man's a man for a' that' – how does he know? <br />Traipsing with his plough, the rural hero, <br />Swaggering down the lea-rigs, talking to mice, <br />Sweating his sickly verses to entice <br />Lassies he'd never see again, strutting <br />Through the salons in his best breeches, rutting <br />In a cloud of claret, buttonholing <br />Lord This, sweet-talking Doctor That, bowling <br />His wit down levees, bosoms, siller quaichs – <br />D'ye think he's ever heard the groans and skraighs <br />Of city gutters, or marked the shapes that wrap <br />Fog and smoke about them as if they could hap <br />Homelessness or keep hunger at bay? What, <br />Not heard or seen, but has he even thought <br />How some, and many, and more than many, survive, <br />Or don't survive, on factory floors, or thrive <br />Or fail to thrive by foundry fires, or try <br />To find the words – sparks scatter and bolts fly – <br />That's feeble – to show the new age its dark face? <br />The Carron Ironworks – how he laughed at the place, <br />Made a joke of our misery, passed on <br />To window-scratch his diamond-trivia, and swan <br />Through country-house and customs-post, servile <br />To the very gods from which he ought to resile! <br />'Liberty's a glorious feast,' you said. <br />Is that right? Wouldn't the poor rather have bread? <br />Burns man, I'm hard on you, I'm sorry for it. <br />I think such poetry is dangerous, that's all. <br />Poetry must pierce the filthy wall <br />With cries that die on country ways. The glow <br />Of bonhomie will not let the future grow.<br /><br />Edwin Morgan<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/james-macfarlan/
