Classic Poem

The strong man of the village where men live by plowing
with their bows and the wells are hacked out of stone to hold
heavily brackish water will be able—even when he is impoverished—
to come up with what he knows he doesn't have—as if he were
an ignorant cowherd in extreme cold kindling a small fire
in the faded evening. When he has something, though very little,
he does not worry about there being many who come to him
in need, but like a woman who is the light of her house,
who deals out food, in due order, within a long, high pavilion,
he can give away a bit here, a bit there according to worth.
But when times go well for him, as with the white rice of sacrifice
poured out in front of their doors by kings
who protect the world, he can, when he is needed, shower down his gifts!