Classic Poem

What the hell?
There's no what the hell about it,
nor a what the heaven either,
but a sort of a what the earth,
what the street, what the gutter!
Shut up?—shut up yourself!
There are plenty of things in this town
to drive a fellow dizzy
without you and me jawing each other—
you up there, me down here:
Such corns as you have you have on your seat,
not on your feet, like me.
This gutter's wide enough for two,
what with you only fat as a whale
and your horse and truck
only half the gutter wide,
but you're a whole gutter wide
when you three try to turn,
twist into angles, obtuse or oblique—
that's what started our trouble, not me!
Me trying to get across,
kind of blind and awfully skimpy,
skimpy from lack of food
and cold from being skimpy—
so I've got to go along
with my chin down my collar,
you can't expect me to see you?
You're no truck driver,
you've got a seat like a king,
you can view the whole world;
you're not only higher up
as a thing on a street,
you're much higher up on a job—
it's not me that's talking down,
it's you and your what the hell!
Leave your words up there,
I'll chuck mine down a sewer,
and come down to the level
of four feet on one sidewalk,
crawl down and shake hands!
Eh?—I'm a scab?—
a lot you know about that!
I've got a truck of my own
you can't see, nor anybody else,
nor me for that matter!
Cracked?—don't fool yourself!—
my truck's a damned sight
bigger and heavier than yours,
and I'm not only the driver
but the driven—
tired bones, knees, feet, tail,
tired reins, harness, wheels, shafts,
tired spokes, screws, grease and all!
And you get a wage
for the sweat of your chum—
me and mine hate each other, soak each other,
flicks and cuts and lashes and blows—
and I get no dollars and he no oats!
You've got a chum
though he's only a tongue-tied horse,
spavined, thin-legged, woe-begone, weary,
little more than a nag with long jaws
that can't even wag what the hell—
but even a bag of bones,
if you live with it and it with you,
is better than hoofing alone—
it's myself my nag drags along.
You don't get me?—and I don't get you,
so for Chri-sake come down and let's try!—
son of a what?—that'll do, so are you!
Eh, you're coming?—
to bust me in the nose?—
little blood you'd spill out of me!—
not to bust it?—thanks, what then?—
to shake?—with me?—hallelujah!
Don't hurry, step easy, you're big
and that wheel worn and wobbly.
And climbing's no cinch,
down worse than up—
you so fat from sitting
all day every day, all year every year—
lack of locomotion—sedentary avoirdupois—
don't look round, don't mind me, you'll fall—
long words, they're my trade, that's all!
Are you down?—great!—
the king's abdicated!
Hey, where are you going—
I'll take back that word?—
eh?—the nag?—oh!—
but what do you want with him?—
say, don't tie him to that pump?—
nor the lamppost, the ashcan!
Do you think he'll escape,
him with a load like that?—
if it weren't for the shafts
wouldn't that head-to-tail carcass
sit down, lie down, rather than run?
Suppose he could, would he run very far?—
wouldn't somebody grab him?—
there's always someone to nab one's freedom?
You get that?—what's that?
Hello? Hello yourself!
Shake? Shake yourself!
Damn it, let go—
where'd you get that grip?
Holding reins?
Wish I'd get a grip like that
holding pencils!
Eh? You don't get that?
Well—what the hell!