Classic Poem

Let her so much as lend pale scrutiny
To some poor fault that words of his reveal,
Offended silence calls for mutiny
To oust the renegade without appeal,
And beckoning grief to starve its anarchy
Imprisons it behind a stony seal
Lest such a spectre's frail humanity
Infect the others with impassioned zeal.

The executioner, gray penitence,
Stooped with the death of each small whitened face,
Is haunted by the ghostly impotence
Through which each sinner importunes his grace
To influence the man not to behead
The brothers of the word for what it said.