4
SALT-WATER BALLADS
Others may sing of the wine and the wealth and the mirth,
The portly presence of potentates goodly in girth;—
Mine he the dirt and the dross, the dust and scum of the earth!
Theirs be the music, the colour, the glory, the gold;
Mine he a handful of ashes, a mouthful of mould.
Of the maimed, of the halt and the hlind in the rain and the cold—
Of these shall my songs be fashioned, my tales be told.
Amen.
