The Clerk

The clerk sat on a stool

And added up a column,

Looking a very fool,

Staid he was and solemn.

He said :

' Nineteen and one,

Mark nought and carry two,'

And that was all that he had done

And all that he could do.

The clerk sat on his stool

And another line began :

The heroes called him fool

But God had called him man.

He said :

' Two fives are ten

And carry one along.

'The devil shuddered in his den

And Heaven broke forth in song.

Charles Williams ~ Poems of Conformity (1917) Milford-OUP