Since Thursday he’d been working overtime, With only three short hours for food and sleep, When no sleep came, because of the dull beat Of his fagged brain; and he could scarcely eat. And now, on Saturday, when he was free, And all his fellows hurried home to tea, He was so dazed that he could hardly keep His hands from going through the pantomime Of keeping-even sheets in his machine-- The sleek machine that, day and night, Fed with paper, virgin white, Through those glaring, flaring hours In the incandescent light, Printed children’s picture-books-- Red and yellow, blue and green, With sunny fields and running brooks, Ships at sea, and golden sands, Queer white towns in Eastern lands, Tossing palms on coral strands-- Until at times the clank and whirr and click, And shimmer of white paper turned him sick; And though at first the colours made him glad, They soon were dancing in his brain like mad; And kept on flaring through his burning head: Now, in a flash, the workshop, flaming red; Now blazing green; now staring blue; And then the yellow glow too well he knew: Until the sleek machine, with roar and glare, Began to take him in a dazzling snare; When, fascinated, with a senseless stare, It drew him slowly towards it, till his hair Was caught betwixt the rollers; but his hand, Almost before his brain could understand, Had clutched the lever; and the wheels were stopped Just in the nick of time; though now he dropped, Half-senseless on the littered workshop floor: And he’d lain dazed a minute there or more, When his machine-girl helped him to a seat. But soon again he was upon his feet, And tending that unsatisfied machine; And printing pictures, red and blue and green, Until again the green and blue and red Went jigging in a riot through his head; And, wildest of the raging rout, The blinding, screeching, racking yellow-- A crazy devil of a fellow-- O’er all the others seemed to shout. For hands must not be idle when the year Is getting through, and Christmas drawing near, With piles on piles of picture-books to print For people who spend money without stint: And, while they’re paying down their liberal gold, Guess little what is bought, and what is sold.