ITHIN a poor man's squalid home I stood:
⁠The one bare chamber, where his work-worn wife
⁠Above the stove and wash-tub passed her life,
Next the sty where they slept with all their brood.

But I saw not that sunless, breathless lair,
⁠The chamber's sagging roof and reeking floor;
⁠The smeared walls, broken sash, and battered door;
The foulness and forlornness everywhere.

I saw a great house with the portals wide
⁠Upon a banquet room, and, from without,
⁠⁠The guests descending in a brilliant line
By the stair's statued niches, and beside
⁠The loveliest of the gemmed and silken rout
⁠⁠The poor man's landlord leading down to dine.⁠