Page:The cry for justice - an anthology of the literature of social protest. - (IA cryforjusticea00sinc).pdf/608

 A Prayer of the Peoples

(From "The Present Hour")

(See pages 561, 572)

God of us who kill our kind! Master of this blood-tracked Mind Which from wolf and Caliban Staggers toward the star of Man— Now, on Thy cathedral stair, God. we cry to Thee in prayer!

Where our stifled anguish bleeds Strangling through Thine organ reeds, Where our voiceless songs suspire From the corpses in Thy choir— Through Thy charred and shattered nave, God, we cry on Thee to save!

Save us from our tribal gods! From the racial powers, whose rods— Wreathed with stinging serpents—stir Odin and old Jupiter From their ancient hells of hate To invade Thy dawning state

Lord, our God! to whom, from clay, Blood and mire, Thy peoples pray— Not from Thy cathedral's stair Thou hearest:—Thou criest through our prayer For our prayer is but the gate: We, who pray, ourselves are fate.