Poems (Shore)/Lamentations
LAMENTATIONS
I Oh, that my head were waters, And fountains were mine eyes, For all thy sons and daughters, Thou world of sins and sighs!Oh, that my heart might speak before it breaks and dies!
Through Youth, through Age, through each Dead Conscience in its turn, Wisdom that will not teach, Folly that will not learn,Through man and woman, too, my words should pierce and burn.
Alas for Youth! because The heart of Youth is old; It thrills not for a cause, But, arrogantly cold,Turns from the fiery summons as a tale twice told.
The holy dangerous ray It shuns, to join the press That throngs the gaslit way Of bare and hard success,And sinks at last, unmissed, to night and nothingness.
Oh, thou that wouldst not soar, Methinks 'twere nobler done To rise, as rose of yore Resplendent Phaethon,And fall—but fall, like him, a rival of the sun!
And if I sigh for Age Because it is too late, Because it has grown sage, But cannot mend its fate,And knows not what Life is till Death is at the gate,
Still more for Age I mourn Because it is afraid, With all its vows forsworn, The world's great cause to aid,And thinks man will not change, but be as he was. made.
And Love—man's doom and jest— What hast thou here to do? In such disguises dressed, We know not false from true;We trust the world to thee, and thou betray'st it too.
Love frivolous and vain, Love coldly overwise, Love sensual and profane, And worshipper of lies—Traitor, depart from us! True love, awake, arise!
II
For Woman most my tears Should set Man's heart on fire, Whose love and threats and jeers Have made of her a liar,That paints her very soul, to win the world's desire.
Oh, Earth! Earth! Mother Earth! Rise, call upon thy son!'— "I bare twain at a birth, And thee, the stronger one—With her I gave to thee, tell me what hast thou done?
"When, fresh from Nature's arms, She first clasped hands with thee, Her noble infant charms Announced a queen to be,Wise, beautiful, and pure, and brave as are the free.
"Thou madst this queen thy slave, In falsehood, fear, and shame; The best her mother gave Was counted her for blame,And Fame suborned to make a byword of her name.
"Reared up to toil by blows, Her childhood pined in fears, Until, at last, a rose Of beauty, as the yearsWent forward, smiled upon the cruel world through tears.
"Then, crowned and chained and scorned, When first her head she raised, A strange new lustre warned Her master, as he gazed,That in her eyes a spirit waked and watched, amazed;
"Against its bars to beat, With plumage blood-besprent, Then flutter to his feet, A guiltless penitent,And kneel to him for pardon, praise, and punishment.
"Rebellious and reviled, Or crouching and caressed, A goddess or a child, But still a slave confessed,Caged in the jealous East, toy-sceptred in the West;
"Alike the tale hath been To-day and long of yore; The dazzling Eastern queen, Bending her lord before,With rubies all a-tremble, and forehead to the floor,
"Still mirrors in old story My nobler daughter, taught To bow down all her glory Of free-born will and thoughtBefore a spectral terror, conjured out of naught.
"Thou claim'st to be her god, To rule her inmost shrine Of conscience with thy rod; Thy mockery is her signFrom Heaven that she hath sinned—against thy laws divine.
"But what of Her that fell To shameless shame for thee? Hark! from that hidden Hell Her cry has risen to me,—How long, oh deaf and blind, how long shall these things be?
"Her soul, that sobs away, Still, still a wasted breath, Her heart, that day by day Bleeds bitterly to death,While writhing that gay mask of dauntless sin beneath,
"No more, no more for Her Let Earth cry out in vain; My depths are all astir, And every pulse is pain,—Rise up, a nobler Brother, loose thy Sister's chain!"