Page:Poems (1915) G K Chesterton.djvu/124

 "King Dives in the garden, we have naught to give or hold—

(Even while the baby came alive the rotten sticks were sold.)

The savage knows a cavern and the peasants keep a plot,

Of all the things that men have had—lo! we have them not.

Not a scrap of earth where ants could lay their eggs—

Only this poor lump of earth that walks about on legs—

Only this poor wandering mansion, only these two walking trees,

Only hands and hearts and stomachs—what have you to do with these?

You have engines big and burnished, tall beyond our fathers' ken,

Why should you make peace and traffic with such feeble folk as men?

"Call upon the wheels, master, call upon the wheels,

They are deaf to demagogues, deaf to crude appeals;

Are our hands our own, master?—how the doctors doubt!

Are our legs our own, master? wheels can run without—

Prove the points are delicate—they will understand.

All the wheels are loyal; see how still they stand!"