I bargained with Life for a penny,

And Life would pay no more.

However I begged at evening

When I counted my scanty store.

For Life is just an employer

He gives you what you ask

But once you have set the wages,

Why, you must bear the task.

I worked for a menials’s hire

Only to learn, dismayed

That any wage I had asked of Life…

Life would have paid. 

-Jessie B. Rittenhouse-