Songs of the Army of the Night Part 3

My Lord, at last you have it! Now we know Truth's not a phrase, justice an idle show.

Your life ran red with murder, green with l.u.s.t.

Blood has washed blood clean, and, in the final dust Your carrion will be purified. Yet, see, Though your body perish, for your soul shall be An immortality of infamy!

"ANARCHISM."

'Tis not when I am here, In these homeless homes, Where sin and shame and disease And foul death comes;

'Tis not when heart and brain Would be still and forget Men and women and children Dragged down to the pit:

But when I hear them declaiming Of "liberty," "order," and "law,"

The husk-hearted gentleman And the mud-hearted bourgeois,

That a sombre hateful desire Burns up slow in my breast To wreck the great guilty temple, And give us rest!

BELGRAVIA BY NIGHT.

"MOVE ON!"

"The foxes have holes, And the birds of the air have nests, But where shall the heads of the sons of men Be laid, be laid?"

"_Where the cold corpse rests_, _Where the sightless moles_ _Burrow and yet cannot make it afraid_, _Rout but cannot wake it again_, _There shall the heads of the sons of men_ _Be laid_, _laid_!"

JESUS.

Where is poor Jesus gone?

He sits with Dives now, And not even the crumbs are flung To Lazarus below.

Where is poor Jesus gone?

Is he with Magdalen?

He doles her one by one Her wages of shame!

Where is poor Jesus gone?

The good Samaritan, What does he there alone?

He stabs the wounded man!

Where is poor Jesus gone, The lamb they sacrificed?

They've made G.o.d of his carrion And labelled it "Christ!"

PARALLELS FOR THE PIOUS.

"He holds a pistol to my head, Swearing that he will shoot me dead, If he have not my purse instead, The robber!"

"_He_, _with the lash of wealth and power_, _Flogs out my heart and flings the dower_, _The plundered pittance of his hour_, _The robber_!"

"He shakes his serpent tongue that lies, Wins trust for poisoned sophistries And stabs me in the dark, and flies, The a.s.sa.s.sin!"

"_He pits me in the dreadful fight_ _Against my fellow_. _Then he quite_ _Strips both his victims in the night_, _The a.s.sa.s.sin_!"

"PRAYER."

This is what I pray In this horrible day, In this terrible night, G.o.d will give me light.

Such as I have had, That I go not mad.

This is what I seek, G.o.d will keep me meek Till mine eyes behold, Till my lips have told All this h.e.l.lish crime.- _Then it's sleeping time_!

TO THE CHRISTIANS.

Take, then, your paltry Christ, Your gentleman G.o.d.

_We_ want the carpenter's son, With his saw and hod.

_We_ want the man who loved The poor and oppressed, Who hated the rich man and king And the scribe and the priest.

_We_ want the Galilean Who knew cross and rod.

It's your "good taste" that prefers A b.a.s.t.a.r.d G.o.d!

"DEFEAT?"

Who is it speaks of defeat?- I tell you a Cause like ours Is greater than defeat can know; It is the power of powers!

As surely as the earth rolls round, As surely as the glorious sun Brings the great world sea-wave, Must our Cause be won!

What is defeat to us?- Learn what a skirmish tells, While the great Army marches on To storm earth's h.e.l.ls!

TO JOHN RUSKIN.

(_After reading his_ "_Modern Painters_.")