For fifty years, Cruel, insatiable Old World, You have punched me over the heart Till you made me cough blood. The few paltry things I gathered You snatched out of my hands. You have knocked the cup from my thirsty lips. You have laughed at my hunger of body and soul. You look at me now and think, "He is still strong, There ought to be twenty more years of good punching there. At the end of that time he will be old and broken, Not able to strike back, But cringing and crying for leave To live a little longer." Those twenty, pitiful, extra years Would please you more than the fifty past, Would they not, Old World? Well, I hold them up before your greedy eyes, And snatch them away as I laugh in your face, Ha! Ha! Bang —! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...MY LIGHT WITH YOURS by EDGAR LEE MASTERS SUMMER NIGHT-BROADWAY by LOUIS UNTERMEYER MEDIOCRITY IN LOVE REJECTED by THOMAS CAREW SONNET TO THE RIVER OTTER by SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE BIRD AND BROOK by WILLIAM HENRY DAVIES THE JEWISH CEMETERY AT NEWPORT by HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW EPISTLE TO DR. ARBUTHNOT by ALEXANDER POPE A LIFE-LESSON by JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY VERSES ADDRESSED TO IMITATOR OF FIRST SATIRE OF HORACE by MARY WORTLEY MONTAGU |