Thus Sosnowski broods, And lives again that moment of hell when fire Burst like a geyser from a vat where gas Had gathered in his ignorance; being sent To light a drying stove within the vat, A work not his, who was the engineer. The gas exploded as he struck the match, And like an insect fixed upon a pin And held before a flame, hands, face and body Were burned and broken as his body shot Up and against the brewery wall. What next? The wearisome and tangled ways of courts With Rufus Fox for foe, four trials in all Where juries disagreed who heard the law Erroneously given by the court. At last a verdict favorable, and a court Sitting above the forum where he won To say, as there's no evidence to show Just how the gas got in the vat, Sosnowski Must go for life with broken hands unhelped. And that the fact alone of gas therein Though naught to show his fault had brought it there, The mere explosion did not speak a fault Against the brewery. Out from court he went To use a broom with crumpled hands, and look For life in mirrors at his ghastly face. And brood until suspicion grew to truth That Rufus Fox had compassed juries, courts; And read of Rufus Fox, who day by day Was featured in the press for noble deeds, For Art or Charity, for notable dinners, Guests, travels and what not. So now the Pole Reading of Elenor Murray, cursed himself That he could brood and wait--for what?--and grow More weak of will for brooding, while this woman Had gone to war and served and ended it, Yet he lived on, and could not go to war; Saw only days of sweeping with these hands, And every day his face within the mirror, And every afternoon this glass of beer, And coarse bread, and these thoughts. And every day some story to arouse His sense of justice; how the generous Give and pass on, and how the selfish live And gather honors. But Sosnowski thought If I could do a flaming thing to show What courts are ours, what matter if I die? What if they took their quick-lime and erased My flesh and bones, expunged my very name, And made its syllables forbidden?--still If I brought in a new day for the courts, Have I not served? he thought. Sosnowski rose And to the bar, drank whiskey, then went out.