Questionnaire
Questionnaire - meaning Summary
Self-scrutiny in Plain Questions
In terse, direct questions the speaker examines his own moral conduct, asking whether he has preached dishonesty, capitalized on poverty, ignored counsel, or made virtue into spectacle. The poem probes hypocrisy, accountability, and the gap between private acts and public displays of goodness. Everyday images—ice, coal, leashed dogs—ground the scrutiny in common life, while the repeated interrogation turns confession into a demand for honest self-assessment.
Read Complete AnalysesHAVE I told any man to be a liar for my sake? Have I sold ice to the poor in summer and coal to the poor in winter for the sake of daughters who nursed brindle bull terriers and led with a leash their dogs clothed in plaid wool jackets? Have I given any man an earful too much of my talk—or asked any man to take a snootful of booze on my account? Have I put wool in my own ears when men tried to tell me what was good for me? Have I been a bum listener? Have I taken dollars from the living and the unborn while I made speeches on the retributions that shadow the heels of the dishonest? Have I done any good under cover? Or have I always put it in the show windows and the newspapers?
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