From the grave, a small-town lawyer sums up what thirty years of late-night poker in the opera house taught him. Tom Beatty sees life itself as the ultimate gambler—unbeatable, untouchable, and immune to any mayor or reformer. He isn’t describing wild chance, though. Life rigs the game: it knows your weakness and plays against it, and no amount of complaining will recover your losses. The poem has a hard, unsentimental mood, part warning and part weary acceptance. The speaker sounds like someone who has watched too many people lose and then humiliate themselves by refusing to leave the table. His advice is blunt: you get roughly seventy years to play; if you can’t win by then, stand up and go. Lingering to whine and fumble the cards is the only real defeat.
Tom Beatty — Summary
I was a lawyer like Harmon Whitney Or Kinsey Keene or Garrison Standard, For I tried the rights of property, Although by lamp-light, for thirty years, In that poker room in the opera house. And I say to you that Life’s a gambler Head and shoulders above us all. No mayor alive can close the house. And if you lose, you can squeal as you will; You’ll not get back your money. He makes the percentage hard to conquer; He stacks the cards to catch your weakness And not to meet your strength. And he gives you seventy years to play: For if you cannot win in seventy You cannot win at all. So, if you lose, get out of the room— Get out of the room when your time is up. It’s mean to sit and fumble the cards And curse your losses, leaden-eyed, Whining to try and try.