This blade in my hand,
Friendlier it has been
Than any man ever had.
No wish have I in industry,
Only to appreciate poetry.

Poetry in its flat,
The craftsmanship in a tang,
Or meeting of the heel
With an untimely end.

Never has it failed,
To prove its mettle,
Justice over many a peel
Countless secrets have I vouchsafed,
Nor once did it keel.

Man is more often defined,
By what he acts not rather than benign.
Treachery, treason, malice, from him,
Unheard traits, fit for the damned,
Then he is beyond man.

Though he was never asked,
That solid calibre of fealty,
Yet from a different meaning
Is indeed industry.

Image Attribution: Charles A. Buchel, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons, Herbert Beerbohm Tree (1852–1917), as Macbeth.