Page:Philosophical Review Volume 25.djvu/529

No. 3.] Have we not fingers to write,
 * Lips to swear at a need?

Then, when danger decamps,
 * Bury the word with the deed.

Exile, what of the night?—
 * The tides and the hours run out,
 * The seasons of death and of doubt,

The night-watches bitter and sore. In the quicksands leftward and right
 * My feet sink down under me;

But I know the scents of the shore
 * And the broad blown breaths of the sea.

Captives, what of the night?—
 * It rains outside overhead
 * Always, a rain that is red,

And our faces are soiled with the rain. Here in the season's despite
 * Day-time and night-time are one,

Till the curse of the kings and the chain
 * Break, and their toils be undone.

Princes, what of the night?—
 * Night with pestilent breath
 * Feeds us, children of death,

Clothes us close with her gloom.
 * Rapine and famine and fright

Crouch at our feet and are fed.
 * Earth where we pass is a tomb,

Life where we triumph is dead.

Martyrs, what of the night?—
 * Nay, is it night with you yet?
 * We, for our part, we forget

What night was, if it were. The loud red mouths of the fight
 * Are silent and shut where we are.

In our eyes the tempestuous air
 * Shines as the face of a star.

Europe, what of the night?—
 * Ask of heaven, and the sea,
 * And my babes on the bosom of me,

Nations of mine, but ungrown.