Page:The Poet in the Desert.djvu/117



POET: Here is a boy, his white face beautiful as a girl's, And on his pale forehead, caressing the long black hair, As a mother might, is the hand of his enemy. His mother waits, for him, alone ; and she a widow ; And for the other, in a vine-covered cottage, Waits a woman, his baby at her breast, singing : "Hush-a-by, baby; Daddy will come. "When the war's over, Daddy will come."

TRUTH: The Devil, like a gross monster which has littered. Now leads his brood from the bloody desolation ; They follow after him, thick as ants ; They swarm over the land like crickets, and hobble like

broken grasshoppers. Cripples; beggars; drunkards; looters; burners; thieves. War, Monster begotten of the giant Greed upon the whore

Patriotism.

POET: War, an obscene beast, world-large, Hiding in the darkest abysses of the primal savagery. Till a man with a red ribbon across his breast Waves a sceptre, like a mischievous monkey ; Then the sea heaves, the earth trembles and the monster Rises, dripping blood.

TRUTH: Patriotism. Power. Profit.

POET: War

Stalks up and down the earth in an iron helmet, Which is Hate ;

With an iron spear, which is Cruelty ; Brandishing an iron sword, which is Revenge. The breath of his nostrils is greed ; his pastime is murder, his wine is blood.

Ill