 | English Roses |  |
THE LAST MAN.
Bald as a vulture,Toothless and blind,
See the result of the curse of our Culture—
Progress of Science and marching of mind;
All head and no body,
All brain without sense,
With a lip more suggestive of tea than of toddy,
And an ear less for music than Greek root or tense!
No fist and no muscle,
No stomach, just nerves
Shrinking in awe from the shade of a tussle,
And a pitiful poacher on female preserves;
Dogs in the gutter,
Birds of the air,
Snap at him, peck at him—thin bread and butter,
Reason's delight and the ages' despair!
Look at him hobbling
Blear-eyed and blank,
Back to the jelly-fish whence he came wobbling
Down the dim times to a dignified rank;
Scold at him, sparrows,
Tramp on him, swine,
And away with homunculus now as he narrows
To mere cerebral tissue his glory Divine.
| English Roses | |