O may the wealthy consider the poor

A found poem by John Woolman

He knew the price of things:
Rye about five shillings
Oatmeal twelve per hundred pound.

Mutton from three pence to five
Bacon seven to nine.
House rent for a poor man

to be paid weekly. To be paid weekly.
Wood for the fire scarce and dear.
Many beasts slain to supply the market.

Those aiming to do business
quick for wealth, hurry in this spirit
while some have been froze to death.

The creation of this day groans loudly.
Poor boys suffer much suffer much
suffer much – sentence crossed out

by the original editorial committee
a deletion that has the effect
– Our Deviation from Christ

of toning down Woolman’s indictment –
Trade from this island to Africa
and some growing outwardly great by gain.

…The fog… the blood … the gain… 
was the gain of oppression that we may remember,
The right use of things. Living on a little…

A fog spread round with people walking
backwards and forwards
their garments had a tincture of blood in ’em

their minds hindered
– the blood the city air the scents –
from the operation of the holy spirit.

O that we may inhabit the mountain
on which they neither hurt nor destroy!
I might get so deep

that I might understand this mystery…
At each illegible point no more
than three or four letters are involved.

Yet through the opening of pure love,
it was a strengthening time to me
and I believe to many more.

Dana: ‘The words here are taken from Woolman’s diary. Thanks to Mike Heller and Woodbrooke for its course on Woolman, 250 years since his death.’

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