Spender, Stephen. "In railway halls, on pavements near the traffic".

Summary

- the speaker sadly informs about ruined beggars who survive rather than live in the streets

- refuses to assume the poetic pose of rendering them as beautiful birds on a "singing tree" when they are not

- traces the suffering back to history, finds "the oppressor" who starves the poor, and lets his anger be more and more freely expressed

- ends with an urge to the reader not to ignore the deprived ones but to let their oppressor suffer

Analysis

- free verse, unrhymed yet melodic

- the motif of Time: the searching back in history, the concluding warning that time does not relieve or even forget suffering, etc.