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Salient. An Organ of Student Opinion at Victoria University College, Wellington N.Z. Vol. 21, No. 3. April 1, 1958

Look on and Laugh

Look on and Laugh

Look on and laugh
At the house of neglect
Where the bread is baked out of rock-flour
And the meat is poisoned with rot.
Look on in pity
For the sand fly heroes
Fighting the battles
Of gods and titans
Fencing with pins
And wailing, "Unfair!"
At having their beads
Lopped off with hatchets.
Look on in scorn
For the dry dug-out men
Whose imaginations
Are shrunk in their skulls
Like shrivelled walnuts,
Who snuff in their nostrils
From grimy bookcases
The wisdom of nonentity.
Look on in wrath
At the frogtamers, wormcharmers,
Fostering as children
Hideous mutations
And saying, "This is the life."

D. A. Patterson