Extermination
A VISION .
With prescient sight that pierced the future's distance,
Through countless centuries of doubts and fears,
I witnessed earth as it will have existence,
In twice a million years!
On such grand lapses from time's pages sundered,
I only dared to gaze in utter awe
Dazzled by new-born power, and while I wondered
As in a dream, I saw.
Vast, populous towns of contour Babylonian,
Temples and palaces imperially rare,
Mazes of marble, grandiose and Neronian,
Towering everywhere!
The teachings of the past seemed to engender
Divinest art in methods most intense;
All I beheld was beauty, form and splendor,
Grace and magnificence!
All who breathed here, sons of forgotten races,
Were of a new and lofty lineage proud;
Moving in plastic strength, with regal faces,
Haughty and Cæsar browed.
And I, whose eyes by God-like divination
To all their secrets were no longer blind,
Read every thought that filled with exaltation
The universal mind.
These creatures knew but one all-sacred duty,
One cult to which the vilest would adhere,
A perfect love of pure impeccable beauty,
Supreme, immense, sincere!
The poesy of broad skies, the moaning ocean,
All Nature's glory, spoke not to their souls,
For art alone they held sublime devotion,
Despising other goals.
No anthems filled the air, no psalms or psalters
Praised the Creator who had given them birth;
His name unknown was honored by no altar
On this strange, perfect earth!
No voices sang harmonious Te Deums,
No prayerful women bowed with pious plaints,
No roses sighed upon the mausoleums
Of long-loved martyr saints!
The woe of Christ to them was but a story,
A pleasing myth of legendary lore.
And in our God's unique, stupendous glory
These men believed no more!
Then, as I gazed upon them in my dreaming,
I saw a man with white, majestic head,
By frantic crowds, from every by-way streaming,
Unto a grim cross led!
Spat on and stoned in his severe affliction,
He calmly stood, nor did his glances quail;
Helpless, I saw his odious crucifixion,
Felt every rugged nail
That tore his feeble palms and feet asunder,
And yet he shrank not in his pride august,
While the great hum of voices like a thunder
Exclaimed, “His pain is just!”
And all the throng, the haughty and the lowly,
Cried: “Peerless Beauty, may thy will be done!
This wretch upon our faultless earth all-holy
Is now the only one!
“No shame, no torture can be too unlawful
To free from his vile feet the ground he trod,
For he who writhes before us, pale and awful,
Dared to believe in God!”
With prescient sight that pierced the future's distance,
Through countless centuries of doubts and fears,
I witnessed earth as it will have existence,
In twice a million years!
On such grand lapses from time's pages sundered,
I only dared to gaze in utter awe
Dazzled by new-born power, and while I wondered
As in a dream, I saw.
Vast, populous towns of contour Babylonian,
Temples and palaces imperially rare,
Mazes of marble, grandiose and Neronian,
Towering everywhere!
The teachings of the past seemed to engender
Divinest art in methods most intense;
All I beheld was beauty, form and splendor,
Grace and magnificence!
All who breathed here, sons of forgotten races,
Were of a new and lofty lineage proud;
Moving in plastic strength, with regal faces,
Haughty and Cæsar browed.
And I, whose eyes by God-like divination
To all their secrets were no longer blind,
Read every thought that filled with exaltation
The universal mind.
These creatures knew but one all-sacred duty,
One cult to which the vilest would adhere,
A perfect love of pure impeccable beauty,
Supreme, immense, sincere!
The poesy of broad skies, the moaning ocean,
All Nature's glory, spoke not to their souls,
For art alone they held sublime devotion,
Despising other goals.
No anthems filled the air, no psalms or psalters
Praised the Creator who had given them birth;
His name unknown was honored by no altar
On this strange, perfect earth!
No voices sang harmonious Te Deums,
No prayerful women bowed with pious plaints,
No roses sighed upon the mausoleums
Of long-loved martyr saints!
The woe of Christ to them was but a story,
A pleasing myth of legendary lore.
And in our God's unique, stupendous glory
These men believed no more!
Then, as I gazed upon them in my dreaming,
I saw a man with white, majestic head,
By frantic crowds, from every by-way streaming,
Unto a grim cross led!
Spat on and stoned in his severe affliction,
He calmly stood, nor did his glances quail;
Helpless, I saw his odious crucifixion,
Felt every rugged nail
That tore his feeble palms and feet asunder,
And yet he shrank not in his pride august,
While the great hum of voices like a thunder
Exclaimed, “His pain is just!”
And all the throng, the haughty and the lowly,
Cried: “Peerless Beauty, may thy will be done!
This wretch upon our faultless earth all-holy
Is now the only one!
“No shame, no torture can be too unlawful
To free from his vile feet the ground he trod,
For he who writhes before us, pale and awful,
Dared to believe in God!”
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