Page:Poems of Emma Lazarus vol 1.djvu/345

330 I here renounce my fatherhood. No child Will I acknowledge mine. Thoa art a wife ; Thy duty is thy husband's. When Antonio Returns from Seville, tell him that his father Is long since dead. Henceforward I will own No kin, no home, no tie. I will away, To-morrow morn, and live an anchorite. One thing ye cannot rob me of — my work. My name shall still outsoar these low, mirk vapors — Not the Ribera, stained with sin and shame. As she hath left it, but the Spagnoletto. My glory is mine own. I have done with it, But I bequeath it to my country. Now I win make friends with beasts — they'11 prove less savage Than she that was my daughter. I have spoken For the last time that word. Thee I curse not ; Thou hast not set thy heel upon my heart ; But yet I will not bless thee. Go. Good-night.

ANNICCA {embracing him).

What ! will you spurn me thus ? Nay, I will bide. And be to thee all that she should have been. Soothe thy declining years, and heal the wound Of this sharp sorrow. Thou shalt bless me still, Father— [Rebbra has yielded for a moment to her embrace ; but, suddenly rising, he pushes her roughly from him.