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Wednesday, January 19, 2022

Socialist Sonnet No. 50

 Arthur Draws the Sword from the Stone

(Or, the labour theory of value)

 

Arthur quarried and gathered the dun stone,

Felled the oak and beech for his charcoal pit,

Fashioned a furnace by hand and fired it,

Then loaded ore into its clay-bound cone

To smelt and run out the molten iron

Into the rough casting modelled in sand,

Cooling into the form for what he planned.

Still brittle then, much remained to be done:

Heat and hammer, heat and hammer to force

Imperfections out, shaping, tempering

And honing until, with blade appearing,

Pommel and guard gilded and fixed, the course

Of manufacture was complete. From stone

By Arthur, king of his craft, the sword was drawn.

 

D. A.

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