Collected Poems (Robinson)/Cassandra
For other versions of this work, see Cassandra (Robinson).
CASSANDRA
I heard one who said: "Verily,What word have I for children here?Your Dollar is your only Word,The wrath of it your only fear.
"You build it altars tall enoughTo make you see, but you are blind;You cannot leave it long enoughTo look before you or behind.
"When Reason beckons you to pause,You laugh and say that you know best;But what it is you know, you keepAs dark as ingots in a chest.
"You laugh and answer, 'We are young;O leave us now, and let us grow.'—Not asking how much more of thisWill Time endure or Fate bestow.
"Because a few complacent yearsHave made your peril of your pride,Think you that you are to go onForever pampered and untried?
"What lost eclipse of history,What bivouac of the marching stars,Has given the sign for you to seeMillenniums and last great wars?
"What unrecorded overthrowOf all the world has ever known,Or ever been, has made itselfSo plain to you, and you alone?
"Your Dollar, Dove and Eagle makeA Trinity that even youRate higher than you rate yourselves;It pays, it flatters, and it's new.
"And though your very flesh and bloodBe what your Eagle eats and drinks,You'll praise him for the best of birds,Not knowing what the Eagle thinks.
"The power is yours, but not the sight;You see not upon what you tread;You have the ages for your guide,But not the wisdom to be led.
"Think you to tread forever downThe merciless old verities?And are you never to have eyesTo see the world for what it is?
"Are you to pay for what you haveWith all you are?"—No other wordWe caught, but with a laughing crowdMoved on. None heeded, and few heard.