Charles Farwell, Edson, "The Wasters" (1927)
WE flung our land away like drunken bums;
Used up our forests with a blithe disdain;
Gave out the People’s heritage to those
Who robbed and re-robbed in the name of Law.
We worked men too long hours, too late in life;
Began with children too young to demur;
Harassed poor women wrecked by waves of chance
Until they knuckled down to those who bought.
Our States in rare magnificence of graft
on gold like swill to bosses’ favored ew;
Our Congress squandered millions year by year
With Business Inefficiency its God.
Too proud to learn from older lands than ours,
Too childish to admit our weaknesses
We flung our bodies, minds and souls away—
Boastful, weak, arrogant, poor, selfish fools.
Published in The Crisis, March 1927