Page:Near nature's heart; a volume of verse (IA nearnaturesheart00jack).pdf/100

 When prayer, and priestly pride through chapels rang With song of marching choir, from narthex bold, And transept, double bay and nave and vault, To over-topping spire, ambitious, firm— What wondrous song from such exalted throng!

And laughing devils, perched on airy stage; Stryge, with arms on parapet for ease; Grim face upheld by hands of demon long, Tongue out, and worn with everlasting sneer; And leering ape, and nameless creatures; beasts Obscene; and unclean birds of prey around, Above thy true yet hybrid art; a cow, Half woman, arms of her in comfort crossed, With evil eye beholds the temples 'neath St. Etienne, St. Jacque, and St. Denis, The "Hotel Dieu," Justice Palace, Law! See hungry ghouls, and vampires, never sated, Fiends eyeing Paris, gibing, mocking all; And cat alive and wild, like devil dead Revived, hath climbed on precipice of stone, Creeping, howling, groaning, pained much; Then plunging far, as if pursued by ghost. And stories of the garden, curdling blood, Of lunatic and felon's leap to death— The whole a hell around fair Notre Dame, Her place and portion, part of thine, O France!

Alas, our boys—let angels weep—our sons Who went to aid of thee, pure as the Virgin Mary some, our soldier sons in air, On earth, and underneath were tempted, caught By countess cunning, rich but fallen far; Entrapped, diseased by women, living hells, That move and search and laugh and win and damn! Indecencies of men—God save the race, That human virtue may not die at last!

O France, all this is not thy nobler heart, What love and honor thou hast ever shown; What triumph for thyself, for us and all! Thy virtue dieth not, nor truth, nor those Inspired of Heaven through the ages past, The now and evermore; these lofty hosts And we, who love aright, will see thy soul, All torn by vice and mocking devils, whole; Triumphant over foes without, within.

Thy Notre Dame, thy little hells, O France; The good and evil, working both—but God!