By then you will have noticed those

Who make up Reagan’s proletariat:

The hungry in their long lines that

Gangling around two sides of city block

Are fully formed by ten o'clock

For meals the good Franciscan fathers feed

Without demur to all who need.

You'll watch the jobless side by side with whores

Setting a home up out of doors.

And every day more crazies who debate

With phantom enemies on the street.

I did see one with bright belligerent eye

Gaze from a doorstep at the sky

And give the finger, with both hands, to God:

But understand, he was not odd

Among the circumstances.

Well, I think

After all that, we'll need a drink.

The struggles of the poor are seen from a relatively comfortable Horatian outside, and the middle-class punch-line about needing a drink moderates any undue saeva indignatio. The greater part of the poem depicts the two brothers enjoying middle-aged pleasures: observing the neighbors, taking a trip on the ferry, climbing the hills, and preparing their dinner, with some elision of the political. This, we may say, is “Horatian” sermo, from 1992.