Classic Poem

I came again for contemplation to the great lava peak
Far above the floor of the desert and the muttering of Man.
Earth exhibited to me the scars of her conflict
And bared the bones of her skeleton.
I saw the silver fingers of the irrigation ditches
And the lines they had drawn of poplars and cottonwoods,
Many oases, jewels of verdure, hung upon
Her nakedness; orchards and honey-smelling fields.
I considered the great cities, the harbors full of ships,
And all that the curious ant had created,
And I considered also the ashes of despair
Left in the footprints of War, the Destroyer;
I was very small in the great bigness — but afar
Were the silver lines of the canals; building much
Out of nothing — cool groves, shady spots,
Retreats for the birds that sang their gladness.
I said how beautiful is fruitfulness from waste.
And I seemed to hear a voice in the desert, saying:
" Thought is the Creator — Peace is the Preserver,
" And Freedom is the keeper of the soul. "
But my soul cried aloud to the listening air:
" Freedom is dead —
" Those lovely eyes, which once were beacons on a hill,
" So mixed with stars they were one company;
" Are dug by mattock-beaks of filthy buzzards.
" That celestial voice which set the stars in motion;
" Calling Man's spirit to an exaltation which
" Defied the penalties of Death is strangled by a thief.
" Freedom is dead. "
The tall cliffs spoke:
" Freedom can never die. She has returned into
" The cosmic spaces whence she came and there
" Awaits another dawn — another people and
" Another soul. When she is called she will
" Come back from the large eternities
" To build another soul — knowing Life's secret.
" A soul of the Masters as well as a soul of the People
" They betray. Ignorance is the betrayer of all. "
Truth — O Truth — I know your voice.
When comes that other Dawn?
" When the People rise from their ignorance, as from
" The desert-marshes wild geese fly up with a
" Loud flapping of wings — darkening the sky.
" When the oppressed oppose the oppressors and
" Once more the heavenly path leads on through broken laws
" And disobedience to Authority. "
The desert is full of mirages and of unseen voices.
I saw a noble, godly band, moving in slow
Procession as a sunlit mist moves on
The shoulders of a mountain. Jesus — Cromwell —
Danton — Franklin — Washington and Jefferson
And all that glorious company who taught
Defiance unto tyranny is obedience to God.
And the splendid traitors, rebels, agitators
Who cradled the Great Republic which has died.
The Republic is dead.
Her mouth is stopped and her hands
Lie helpless by her side.
I heard the voice of the cliff. " You rot in riches,
" Your god has guts of gold. "
I saw a strange, sad trinity: a tall
Gaunt man, another not so tall, between
Them a young Negro lad. Against the sky
A gallows stood. The sad, bowed one spoke clear.
" We hold Man has no higher inspiration than
" Bold disobedience to a law that rules
" His peaceful liberty — no higher duty to
" Mankind than breaking every law of property
" Or thought which keeps men slaves. "
The mirage melted and the voices hushed.
My soul knew — Freedom is God —
And disobedience to Tyranny Divine.
Truth, must the glorious sunrise always come so red?
" Ask of the Masters who have snatched
" The roseate nipple from between their brother's lips. "
But who will teach the people, who will lead?
" The Masters — Makers of bloody Revolution.
" The end is always packed in the beginning,
" The apple is in the bud, and the worm is in the blossom.
" Never have the Masters yielded — as the lion does
" Not yield the prey on which he holds his paw.
" Always the Masters scourge the people to
" The sacrament of blood, from which,
" The Resurrection and the Life — Look. "
I saw a multitude filling the earth,
As the insurgent sea fills the long shore.
On came the host — broad as the front of the sea
That heaves and swells and ominously mounts
Until it bursts in mighty fury, tearing the sand.
Above them were their standards, writhing as
Two dragons. On one was written " Freedom, "
On the other " Justice. " They were written in blood.
Beneath them swelled the ever mounting sea;
Men with pallid faces; grime upon the pallor,
Women with despairful eyes — beating flat breasts;
Little, thin-armed children who have never laughed.
Fluttering, jumping, dancing like demons
Were their banners — rags of their poverty;
The tramp of their feet was the ponderous throb
Of an engine without a master.
They come from the mines, the mills and the factories.
They come from hell-holes of steamers where naked stokers sweat.
They come from the slimy slums of cities; fetid their breathing.
They come from narrow, dripping tunnels, from dark
And dangerous caverns, from the clamorous
Penitentiaries of Industry and the infernos
Of furnaces. They come from devouring cities and
From mocking fields that reach up arms to drag them down.
Their banners grimace against the dawn and the rags
Of their misery jump with demoniac glee.
They bear knives and guns which they themselves have made
And bombs of their own craftsmanship.
Behind them, hobbling, grinning, leering, crowding,
Scramble all the misshapen spawn of a bastard, Civilization.
As leaves on the floor of a November forest, they cover
The earth and their breathing is like
The rustle of leaves in Autumn.
They are not going down into the pits.
They are not marching up to the factories.
They are not going to dance with the mind-madding looms.
They are not hastening to feed the insatiate furnaces.
They will not turn back.
They will not turn back, more than the centuries
Turn not back,
More than the rivers turn not back,
More than the waves turn not back,
Which hurl great ships on the rocks
And churn their bones savagely.
The Masters, with machine guns and hired armies
Have insisted on blood. The State has acquiesced
And these have accepted the challenge.
They press forward ready to kill and be killed.
They play with bombs of their own making.
They have cut their saws into swords.
Their breasts are naked and their eyes are fixed;
They are willing to die.
Death is their drummer and he drums to the unnamed
Oppressed whose graves are forgotten.
On the back of each is a knapsack, so it seems,
Bowing him over: the untold suffering
Through all the centuries of the toiling Poor.
The endless martyrdom of the patient Poor under the feet
Of the masters; their blood, welling up forever,
About the knees of the oppressors.
I heard them chanting:
" O Revolution — dark and brooding Angel;
" Ministrant, lifting up the bruised head
" And wiping the bloody froth from martyr lips;
" Bringing water to those dying of thirst;
" Savior and Deliverer — Helper and Preserver.
" Come to us — Save and deliver us.
" Your feet are the strong feet of a runner
" Who fears not to win the race; running over sharp stones.
" Your head is crowned with thorns, so that precious drops
" Drip down your face — your hands, are gilt
" With blood where they have been torn,
" Heaving sharp stones from the path.
" Awful Angel of the Holy Presence,
" Come and set the captive free.
" Dark, silent, cruel and merciful One,
" Do not hold yourself aloof too long.
" You are our only Hope — You are our only Redeemer.
" Come with thunder and with lightning that the air may be clear.
" Come with deluge and tempest; washing Earth clean.
" Come with agony and bloody rain; that life be made anew.
" Pitch headlong from the heavenly battlements
" And with purifying fire, destroy this present,
" Monstrous and misshapen world, that from
" Its ashes another may arise;
" Templed for Justice and for Freedom — for Beauty and for Love,
" That the little children be born into joy. "