Classic Poem

Tall, and stout, and solid-looking,
Yet a wreck;
None would think Death's finger's hooking
Him from deck.
Cause of half the fun that's started —
" Hard-case " Dan —
Isn't like a broken-hearted,
Ruined man.

Walking-coat from tail to throat is
Frayed and greened —
Like a man whose other coat is
Being cleaned;
Gone for ever round the edging
Past repair —
Waistcoat pockets frayed with dredging
After " sprats " no longer there.

Wearing summer boots in June, or
Slippers worn and old —
Like a man whose other shoon are
Getting soled.
Pants? They're far from being recent —
But, perhaps, I'd better not —
Says they are the only decent
Pair he's got.

And his hat, I am afraid, is
Troubling him —
Past all lifting to the ladies
By the brim.
But, although he'd hardly strike a
Girl, would Dan,
Yet he wears his wreckage like a
Gentleman!

Once — no matter how the rest dressed —
Up or down —
Once, they say, he was the best-dressed
Man in town.
Must have been before I knew him —
Now you'd scarcely care to meet
And be noticed talking to him
In the street.

Drink the cause, and dissipation,
That is clear —
Maybe friend or kind relation
Cause of beer.
And the talking fool, who never
Reads or thinks,
Says, from hearsay: " Yes, he's clever;
But, you know, he drinks. "

Been an actor and a writer —
Doesn't whine —
Reckoned now the best reciter
In his line.
Takes the stage at times, and fills it —
" Princess May " or " Waterloo "
Raise a sneer? — his first line kills it,
" Brings 'em, " too.

Where he lives, or how, or wherefore
No one knows;
Lost his real friends, and therefore
Lost his foes.
Had, no doubt, his own romances —
Met his fate;
Tortured, doubtless, by the chances
And the luck that comes too late.

Now and then his boots are polished,
Collar clean,
And the worst grease stains abolished
By ammonia or benzene:
Hints of some attempt to shove him
From the taps,
Or of someone left to love him —
Sister, p'r'aps.

After all, he is a grafter,
Earns his cheer —
Keeps the room in roars of laughter
When he gets outside a beer.
Yarns that would fall flat from others
He can tell;
How he spent his " stuff " , my brothers,
You know well.

Manner puts a man in mind of
Old club balls and evening dress,
Ugly with a handsome kind of
Ugliness.
One of those we'd say of grimly,
At the morgue — or mean hotel
Where they held the inquests dimly:
" He looked well. "

I will be — so goes the rumour —
Down! like Dan;
But I shall not have the humour
Of the man
Nor the sight — well, deem it blindness
As the general public do —
Nor his love of human kindness
And his grit to see it through!