Page:Complete Poetical Works of John Greenleaf Whittier (1895).djvu/337

Rh :Hath called thee from thy task-field shall not lack
 * Yet bolder champions, to beat bravely back

The wrong which, through his poor ones, reaches Him: Yet firmer hands shall Freedom’s torch-lights trim,
 * And wave them high across the abysmal black,

Till bound, dumb millions there shall see them and rejoice.

of noon, like burning lances, through the tree-tops flash and glisten, As she stands before her lover, with raised face to look and listen.

Dark, but comely, like the maiden in the ancient Jewish song: Scarcely has the toil of task-fields done her graceful beauty wrong.

He, the strong one and the manly, with the vassal’s garb and hue, Holding still his spirit’s birthright, to his higher nature true;

Hiding deep the strengthening purpose of a freeman in his heart, As the gregree holds his Fetich from the white man’s gaze apart.

Ever foremost of his comrades, when the driver’s morning horn Calls away to stifling mill-house, to the fields of cane and corn:

Fall the keen and burning lashes never on his back or limb; Scarce with look or word of censure, turns the driver unto him.

Yet, his brow is always thoughtful, and his eye is hard and stern; Slavery’s last and humblest lesson he has never deigned to learn.

And, at evening, when his comrades dance before their master’s door, Folding arms and knitting forehead, stands he silent evermore.

God be praised for every instinct which rebels against a lot Where the brute survives the human, and man’s upright form is not!

As the serpent-like bejuco winds his spiral fold on fold Round the tall and stately ceiba, till it withers in his hold;

Slow decays the forest mouarch, closer girds the fell embrace, Till the tree is seen no longer, and the vine is in its place;

So a base and bestial nature round the vassal’s manhood twines, And the spirit wastes beneath it, like the ceiba choked with vines.

God is Love, saith the Evangel; and our world of woe and sin Is made light and happy only when a Love is shining in.

Ye whose lives are free as sunshine, finding, wheresoe’er ye roam, Smiles of welcome, looks of kindness, making all the world like home;

In the veins of whose affections kindred blood is but a part, Of one kindly current throbbing from the universal heart;

Can ye know the deeper meaning of a love in Slavery nursed, Last flower of a lost Eden, blooming in that Soil accursed?

Love of Home, and Love of Woman!—dear to all, but doubly dear To the heart whose pulses elsewhere measure only hate and fear.

All around the desert circles, underneath a brazen sky, Only one green spot remaining where the dew is never dry!