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 18 WILLIAM ROSE BENiJT

They are blinded with long sleep,

But men with clever weapons

Goad them to fresh pastures.

Beside still waters

They drink of blood and neigh a horrible laughter,

And their ponderous tread shakes happy cities

down, And the thresh of their flail-like tails Makes acres smoulder and smoke Blackened of golden harvest.

The Beasts are back,

And men, in their spreading shadow.

Inhale the odor of their nauseous breath.

Inebriate with it they fashion other gods

Than the gods of day-dream.

Of iron and steel are little images

Made of the Beasts.

And men rush forth and fling themselves for ritual

Before these gods, before the lumbering Beasts, —

And some make long obeisance.

Umber and violet flowers of the sky,

The sun, like a blazing Mars, clanks across the

blue And plucks you, to fashion into a nosegay To offer Venus, his old-time paramour. But now she shrinks

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