Page:The poems of Emma Lazarus volume 1.djvu/298

284 Obscure are all beginnings. Yet I muse With pleasing pain on those fierce years of struggle. They were to me my birthright; all the vigor, The burning passion, the unflinching truth, My later pencil gained, I gleaned from them. I prized them. I reclaimed their ragged freedom, Rather than hold my seat, a liveried slave, At the rich board of my Lord Cardinal. A palace was a prison till I reared Mine own. But now my child’s heart I would pierce Sooner than see it bear the least of ills, Such as I then endured.

Donna Maria May smile, sir, at your threat; she is in a pleasance, Where no rude breezes blow, no shadow falls Darker than that of cool and fragrant leaves. Yea, were it otherwise—had you not reaped The fruit of your own works, she had not suffered. Your children are Spain’s children.