Page:Plays in Prose and Verse (1922).djvu/89

Rh. I said the poets hung Images of the life that was in Eden About the child-bed of the world, that it, Looking upon those images, might bear Triumphant children. But why must I stand here, Repeating an old lesson, while you starve?

. Tell on, for I begin to know the voice. What evil thing will come upon the world If the Arts perish?

. If the Arts should perish, The world that lacked them would be like a woman, That looking on the cloven lips of a hare, Brings forth a hare-lipped child.

. But that’s not all: For when I asked you how a man should guard Those images, you had an answer also, If you’re the man that you have claimed to be, Comparing them to venerable things God gave to men before he gave them wheat.

. I answered—and the word was half your own— That he should guard them as the Men of Dea Guard their four treasures, as the Grail King guards His holy cup, or the pale, righteous horse The jewel that is underneath his horn, Pouring out life for it as one pours out