This week’s choice follows on fairly naturally from last week’s in that A.E.Housman, himself a lifelong closet homosexual, wrote this savagely ironic denunciation of the laws and attitudes then prevailing in response to the trial and imprisonment of Oscar Wilde: it is easy to forget just how much of a social and indeed criminal stigma attached to homosexuality only a couple of generations ago. I don’t myself have a dog in this fight, but for what it’s worth see no reason to quarrel with the consensus now prevailing, at least in the West, that what really matters about people is that they should be kind, honest and reliable and that when it comes to consenting adults there are more things in this world to get exercised about (and indeed, more interesting things to think about) than other people’s sexual proclivities.

Due to the climate of the time Housman felt obliged to suppress its publication until after his death in 1936, and of course it still took many years after that before certain hair colours became acceptable.

poll: the part of the head on which hair grows
haling: dragging, esp. with force or violence
oakum: a preparation of tarred fibres used to seal gaps e.g. between planks in ships. At one time it was recycled from old tarry ropes, and the job of doing this was given to prisoners deemed unsuitable for heavier labour. It was a much hated task, causing the fingers to bleed.
Portland: a tied island in the English Channel, connected to the mainland by Chesil Beach, and the source of Portland limestone, a much-prized building stone that continues to be quarried there.

The Colour of His Hair

Oh who is that young sinner with the handcuffs on his wrists?
And what has he been after, that they groan and shake their fists?
And wherefore is he wearing such a conscience-stricken air?
Oh they’re taking him to prison for the colour of his hair.

’Tis a shame to human nature, such a head of hair as his;
In the good old time ’twas hanging for the colour that it is;
Though hanging isn’t bad enough and flaying would be fair
For the nameless and abominable colour of his hair.

Oh a deal of pains he’s taken and a pretty price he’s paid
To hide his poll or dye it of a mentionable shade;
But they’ve pulled the beggar’s hat off for the world to see and stare,
And they’re haling him to justice for the colour of his hair.

Now ’tis oakum for his fingers and the treadmill for his feet,
And the quarry-gang on Portland in the cold and in the heat,
And between his spells of labour in the time he has to spare
He can curse the God that made him for the colour of his hair.

A.E.Housman