Borrower and Lender Be - Edit

[dukealien]

Borrower and Lender Be
(Contra Polonius)


To owe is to have promised, sworn one’s future,
as to lend is to accept an oath;
faith and credit aren’t divisible,
nor belief and trust.

Absent trust there’s only loan-sharking:
fear and threats, vigorish on principal
long vanished, its repayment
never contemplated or desired.

Misplacing trust yields only fraud,
evasion, flight by night
before a chilled-out mark discovers
his greed expertly reciprocated.

Truth is indispensable: both lender
and recipient must know themselves,
that neither’s hawk nor pigeon
but self-worthy of belief.

To owe is to have promised,
as to lend is to accept a promise;
faith and credit are not separate,
nor belief and trust.

Absent trust there’s only loan-sharking,
fear and threats, vigorish on principal
long vanished with repayment
never contemplated or desired.

With trust misplaced there’s only fraud,
evasion, flight by night,
before a chilled-out mark discovers
his greed cleverly reciprocated.

Information’s key: that lender and
recipient both know themselves, in truth,
that neither’s hawk nor pigeon
but both worthy of belief.

Is debt a fit subject, despite so many poets having spent their lives in it? Not very happy with this, so any critique welcomed