| All you great men of power,
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| You who boast of your feats,
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| Politicians and entrepreneurs:
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| Can you safeguard your breath in the night while you sleep,
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| Keep your heart beating steady and sure?
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| As you lie in your bed,
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| Does the thought haunt your head,
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| That your really rather small?
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| If there’s one thing I know in this life,
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| We are beggars all!
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| All you champions of science,
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| And rulers of men:
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| Can you summon the sun from it’s sleep?
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| And does the earth seek your council on how fast to spin?
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| Can you shut up the gates of the deep?
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| And don’t you know that all things,
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| Hang as if by string o’er the darkness,
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| Poised to fall?
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| If there’s one thing I know in this life,
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| We are beggars all!
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| All you big-shots who swagger,
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| And stride with conceit.
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| Did you devise how your frame would be formed?
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| If you’d be raised in a palace,
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| or live out on the streets,
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| choose the place or the hour you’d be born?
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| Tell me what can you claim?
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| Not a thing!
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| Not your name!
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| Tell me if you can recall,
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| Just one thing, not a gift, in this life?
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| Can you hear what’s been said?
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| Can you see now that everything’s graced?
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| After all,
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| If there’s one thing I know in this life,
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| We are beggars all! |