Page:Poems of Emma Lazarus vol 2.djvu/172

154 They allow Full five hours' grace to shrive our souls with prayer. We shall assemble in the Synagogue, As on Atonement Day, confess our sins, Recite the Kaddish for the Dead, and chant Our Shibboleth, the Unity of God, Until the supreme hour when we shall stand Before the mercy-seat. In what dread shape Approaches death ? Nerve your young hearts, my children. We shall go down as God's three servants went Into the fiery furnace. Not again Shall the flames spare the true-believers' flesh. The anguish shall be fierce and strong, yet brief. Our spirits shall not know the touch of pain, Pure as refined gold they shall issue safe From the hot crucible ; a pleasing sight Unto the Lord. Oh, 't is a rosy bed Where we shall couch, compared with that whereon They lie who kindle this accursed blaze. Ye shrink ? ye would avert your martyred brows