Yet neither do you speak the tongue of the master
    whom you serve. 
No more do you know of us the “Masters” than you
    know of them the “dogs.” 
We are above you, they below. 
And between us you stand, guarding the street, erect
    and splendid, lithe and male.  Your scarlet turban
    frames your neat black head,
And you are thinking.

Or are you? 
Perhaps we only are stung with thought. 
I wonder.

  Shanghai

The Lady of Easy Virtue:  An American

Lotus,
So they called your name. 
Yet the green swelling pod, the fruit-like seeds and
    heavy flower, are nothing like to you. 
Rather, like a pitcher plant you are, for hope and all
    young wings are drowned in you.

Your slim body, here in the cafe, moves brightly in
    and out.  Green satin, and a dance, white wine
    and gleaming laughter, with two nodding earrings—­these
    are Lotus. 
And in the painted eyes cold steel, and on the lips a
    vulgar jest;
Hands that fly ever to the coat lapels, familiar to
    the wrists and to the hair of men.  These too
    are Lotus. 
And what more—­God knows!

You too perhaps were stranded here, like these poor
    homesick boys, in this great catch-all where the
    white race ends, this grim Shanghai that like a
    sieve hangs over filth and loneliness. 
You were caught here like these, and who could live,
    young and so slender—­in Shanghai? 
Green satin, and a gleaming throat, and painted eyes
    of steel,
Hunter or hunted,
Peace be with you,
Lotus!

  Shanghai

In the Mixed Court:  Shanghai

Two men sit in judgment on their fellows. 
Side by side they sit, raised on the pedestal of the law,
   at grips with squalor and ignorance. 
They are civilization—­and they are very grave.

One of them is of my own people, a small man, definite,
    hard-featured, an accurate weapon of small
    calibre. 
Of the other I cannot judge. 
He is heavily built, and when he is still the dignity of
    the Orient is about him like his robe.  His head
    is large and beautifully domed, his hands tapering
    and aristocratic. 
When he speaks it is of subtleties. 
But when he speaks his dignity drops from him.  His
    eyes shift quickly from one end of their little slit
    to the other, his mouth, his full brown mouth,
    moves over-fast, his hands flicker back and forth.

The courtroom is crowded with ominous yellow poverty. 
The cases are of many sorts. 
A woman, she of the little tortured feet and sullen face,
    has kidnapped a small boy to sell.  A man was
    caught smuggling opium.  A tea-merchant, in
    dark green silk, complains