Page:The cry for justice - an anthology of the literature of social protest. - (IA cryforjusticea00sinc).pdf/587

 Kruppism

(From "The Present Hour")

(American poet and dramatist, born 1875)

Crowned on the twilight battlefield, there bends A crooked iron dwarf, and delves for gold, Chuckling: "One hundred thousand gatlings—sold!" And the moon rises, and a moaning rends The mangled living, and the dead distends, And a child cowers on the chartless wold, Where, searching in his safety vault of mold, The kobold kaiser cuts his dividends.

We, who still wage his battles, are his thralls, And dying do him homage; yea, and give Daily our living souls to be enticed Into his power. So long as on war's walls We build engines of death that he may live, So long shall we serve Krupp instead of Christ.

(1729-1796)

The only way to save our empires from the encroachment of the people is to engage in war, and thus substitute national passions for social aspirations.