Poems (Henley)/Tree, Old Tree of the Triple Crook

by William Ernest Henley

XVII CARMEN PATIBULARE To H. S.

Tree, Old Tree of the Triple Crook And the rope of the Black Election,'Tis the faith of the Fool that a race you rule Can never achieve perfection:So 'It's O, for the time of the new Sublime And the better than human way,When the Rat (poor beast) shall come to his own And the Wolf shall have his day!'

For Tree, Old Tree of the Triple Beam And the power of provocation,You have cockered the Brute with your dreadful fruit Till your thought is mere stupration: And "It's how should we rise to be pure and wise, And how can we choose but fall,So long as the Hangman makes us dread, And the Noose floats free for all?'

So Tree, Old Tree of the Triple Coign And the trick there's no recalling,They will haggle and hew till they hack you through And at last they lay you sprawling:When 'Hey! for the hour of the race in flower And the long good-bye to sin!'And the fires of Hell gone out for the lack Of the fuel to keep them in!'

But Tree, Old Tree of the Triple Bough And the ghastly Dreams that tend you,Your growth began with the life of Man, And only his death can end you.They may tug in line at your hempen twine, They may flourish with axe and saw;But your taproot drinks of the Sacred Springs In the living rock of Law.

And Tree, Old Tree of the Triple Fork, When the spent sun reels and blunders Down a welkin lit with the flare of the Pit As it seethes in spate and thunders,Stern on the glare of the tortured air Your lines august shall gloom,And your master-beam be the last thing whelmed In the ruining roar of Doom.