We were trapped in far oases,
And the darkness of our faces
Proclaims that for hard slavery and trouble we were born,
To live here as thralls and wretches,
With the beasts, on herbs and vetches,
The poor toilers of the city, the proud Carthaginian's scorn.

In our land of moss and melons
We lived not as hated felons;
We were princes plumed and radiant and the lords of many herds.
And we loved our shining beaches
And the fertile forest-reaches,

For nothing, nothing lasts; the world is dreaming
Of future joys that earthly bliss transcend;
When dead, I say, our souls with nothing blend.
Death is the sad, inevitable end,
And after, there is hope not, nor redeeming.

And that is why I love in vales Judean
To wander, drinking life at every pore,
Praising the sea and worshiping the shore,
For I shall once more die and hear no more

For I, called Lazarus, the Resurrected,
Affirm that false is what the Prophet saith;
I, who have seen decay, and doom, and death,
Loudly attest, until my dying breath,
That we, earth's worms, by God are unprotected.

Beyond the tomb's most explicable portal,
Shuddering, I tell to you that there is naught!
Unteach, unteach, all that ye have been taught,
Seek not, oh world! what ye have ever sought!

Ah, madman that I am! Thou canst not save me!
For I know all , Christ! Thou hast not the power
To stay the simple wilting of a flower,
Or give unto the utter doomed an hour!
Death, death alone is great, and he can brave me!

Ah why, my Savior, didst thou strangely take me
From dire annihilation's utter rest,
Urged by my sister's sorrowing request?
Why, when the napkin on my brow was pressed,

When words were mine, I, then, the Heaven-protected,
Eagerly bent my brows and whispered low:
" Oh peerless friend! Oh Christ who lov'st me so!
Speak, shall I ever again death's odium know,
Now that by thee I have been resurrected? "

And he, as if his miracle repenting,
Cast down vague eyes and sadly murmured: " Yes! "
Then turned away his face in deep distress,

Sharp throes and torrid harbingers of fever
Came swift upon me, and I felt death nigh,
And yet no tear regretful blurred my eye.
Death will be balked; He will not let me die,
He, the all-healing and sublime reliever.

Thus in my woe I raved, in anguish sighing,
Tortured and bent, the prey to growing pain.
My sisters sent quick messengers in vain,
While he, who cleansed the lepers of the plain,

I dwelt in sunny Bethany contented,
Master of fertile lands and orchards rare,
Housed with my sister Mary, who was fair,
And Martha, who revered me as a prayer,
While naught the peace of my calm mind tormented.

The golden bees among my hives were many,
My flowers and fruit were paid in Roman gold;
The cattle and sleek sheep within my fold
Were sought from distant Carmel to be sold,

And, stammering, pale, his outraged spirit broken,
He stood and groaned his sorrow forth in sighs
That mingled with my loud, exulting cries,
While in an anguish left by man unspoken
The rebel tears gushed slowly from his eyes.

But I was unappeased and cried unto him,
Glad of his misery: " Art thou yet content?
Wilt thou believe me now, oh, prophet sent?
Ah! I demand thy brother's blood; pursue him;

" Why dost thou stand there, Moses, dumb and awful?
The God thou hast left will curse thy senile sneer!
Wilt thou not answer me, grim man austere?
Speak, moody patriarch! Is thy silence lawful?
Thou dealst out justice; deal it to me here!

" Oh, saintly insensate mortal, unimpassioned,
I say to thee that Israel, gone astray,
Is forced thy brother's mandates to obey,
And he, all-guilty, with his palms has fashioned

" His altars are cast down! They love another,
A heavy clod of senseless, speechless gold!
The wolves are many in Jehovah's fold,
And every heart by thine irreverent brother
To misery and damnation has been sold.

" Thy impious Aaron who from duty falters,
The pagan Levite, the anointed priest,
In orgy obscene and many a loathesome feast
Hails Apis now, and Mnevis, on thine altars,