Page:Poems (1915) G K Chesterton.djvu/112

 You pinched a child to a torture price

That you dared not name in words;

So black a jest was the silver bit

That your own speech shook for the shame of it,

And the coward was plain as a cow they hit

When the cattle have strayed at Swords.

The wheel of the torment of wives went round

To break men's brotherhood;

You gave the good Irish blood to grease

The clubs of your country's enemies;

You saw the brave man beat to the knees:

And you saw that it was good.

The rope of the rich is long and long—

The longest of hangmen's cords;

But the kings and crowds are holding their breath,

In a giant shadow o'er all beneath

Where God stands holding the scales of Death

Between the cattle and Swords.

Haply the lords that hire and lend,

The lowest of all men's lords,

Who sell their kind like kine at a fair,

Will find no head of their cattle there;

But faces of men where cattle were:

Faces of men—and Swords.