The Beggars Of Benidorm Market

Nightfall, cold eye - neither disheartens

These goatish tragedians who

Hawk misfortune like figs and chickens

And, plaintiff against each day, decry

Nature's partial, haphazard thumb.

Under white wall and Moorish window

Grief's honest grimace, debased by time,

Caricatures itself and thrives

Extorting pity's coin. At random

A beggar stops among eggs and loaves,

Props a leg-stump upon a crutch,

Jiggles his tin cup at the goodwives.

By lack and loss these beggars encroach

On spirits tenderer than theirs,

Suffering-toughened beyond the fetch

Of finest conscience.

Nightfall obscures

The bay's sheer, extravagant blue,

White house and almond grove. The beggars

Outlast their evilest star, wryly

And with a perfidious verve

Baffle the dark, the pitying eye.