Classic Poem

MARTYRS OF I TALIAN J USTICE

I

Struggling through fog and gloom the dreary light
Of day dawns over Rome:
Life faintly stirs: but silence dread as night
Still broods o'er hearth and home.

Upon the gardens of the Vatican
Weighs like a pall of lead
November: no birds sing, the sky is wan
And pale, the trees are dead.

Yellow and white and grey the drifting leaves
Drop softly to the ground —
A mournful shower, that ever deeper weaves
A winding-sheet around

The statues, youthful gods of Grecian art
Who, in the times gone by,
Have watched the glories of the world depart
And now seem fain to die.

That day the High Priest woke in cheerful mood:
Naught but grey skies to see,
Framed in the gilded casement, was right good:
He rubbed his hands with glee.

Though the fair face of Nature seemed deformed
In horror of coming death,
Feeling his limbs still by the soft sheets warmed,
" Yea. I am strong," he saith.

" My Sainted Predecessor, many a year
Since thy brave deed hath fled.
Thou, Peter, wert contented with an ear,
I shall cut off the head.

" This time upon our side the legions gather,
Of Jesus take no reck!
For He, shut up in Sacro Cuore, by Father
Curci is held in check.

" I am a strong old man: to heart and head
I feel fresh life-blood given:
Put a new edge upon the axe which sped
Locatelli to heaven.

" Let it be brandished flashing bright and bold,
Subtle like thought and swift:
Erect a goodly gibbet: spend the gold
Of Menabrea's gift.

" Frenchmen, put by Voltaire's Mahomet ; in short,
Come show a just repentance,
And, as my assessors in the Sacred Court,
Help ratify our sentence.

" In San Niccola grant indulgences!
Expose the Body of God,
And before Italy my daughter these
Two heads that drip with blood!"

II

And yet thy hair is white: yet flow the fountains
Of life more sluggish in thee day by day,
Dwindling in heart and brain as in the mountains
A cloud is lost and slowly melts away.

O grant them now their lives! To one his twenty
Years are proud heralds of nobler years in store,
And in his breast spring youthful hopes in plenty
E'en though he languish on thy dungeon floor.

The other sees three children grow about him
Like chestnut shoots beneath the parent tree:
But now they droop, and their sad mother without him
At sunset trembles, when she thinks of thee.

Ah, long ago, when by the Jordan river,
By cities glad with olive, the gentle soul
Of Christ, the young Prince, mighty to deliver,
Drew all men unto Him to make them whole,

No mothers trembled: nay, from death He frees us:
For did not Nain see Him death's power destroy?
And whether more to kiss her son or Jesus
The weeping widow knew not in her joy.

The little blue-eyed children sought His blessing
Lovely He was and meek — they trusted Him.
And, while He stood their golden curls caressing
With sinless hands, His eyes with tears were dim.

But thou, in whose vile soul no love of God is,
Smitest with crime-stained fist these heads to earth,
In blood, that streams from their dead fathers' bodies,
Stifling the tender blossoms at their birth.

Thou in the sight of parents in their anguish
(Whose limbs like thine are old and tottering)
Diggest graves for their sons, while yet they languish
In prison, O bloody cleric, unwarlike king.

Priest, prove them false who say that thou dost glory
None e'er from thy black den safe issueth.
Come, Christian Polyphemus, deny the story
That thou in thirty days canst nurture death.

Oh, clasp him to thy bosom, crying: " Heaven
Bids peace and blessing flow from the Papal Throne,"
And thou shalt feel new life-blood to thee given
By that young heart that beats against thine own. . . .

Fixed in his cruel purpose he remaineth
(Our prayers are vain, he scoffs at our distress):
Mercy and love as weakness he disdaineth,
In him alone old age was pitiless.

III

'Tis better so! Blood of the slain rise up
To heaven! Hasten fate!
Be as red wine of vengeance in the cup
Our sons to inebriate —

Our sons, whom we had taught to love, to whom
The Future now appears
So bright, let Hate thus early with its gloom
O'ercast their boyhood's years!

Look, listen, opposed continents, ye mountains
Rebellious 'gainst the sky,
Isles of the ocean fair with woods and fountains,
And ships that travel by;

And thou, O Europe, wayworn Handmaid, who
Dost fall and rise again;
And thou, who 'cross the Atlantic dost pursue
The star of William Penn;

And ye, whom shafts of tropic sunlight pierce,
Who snakes and tyrants feed,
Vast Africa and Asia, and ye fierce,
Ye coloured tribes, give heed!

And thou, O Sun divine, see this old man's
Bland, honest features, see
His bloodstained hands and healthy countenance!
The Chouans' angel he!

He, ere the executioner hath washed
The fatal scaffold, drives out
To gloat on people's horror, unabashed
Their righteous grief to flout.

He, struck with ghastly madness, wags his head
Like a drunk man, and feels
A bestial desire to see the red
Drops splash his gilded wheels.

Old man, the cruel pageants, that with glee
Thou plannest, we disdain.
He who the two La Galas saved bids thee
Cut off men's heads in vain.

Two thou hast quenched: but thousands wait the call.
Yea, and more thousands still.
Our white tents gleam by every city wall,
They gleam on plain and hill,

Where'er spring love and light, in every region
That noble hearts can cherish:
Old man, we are the sacred Theban legion,
And we can never perish.

Our way is strewn with graves, but like an altar
Each grave is decked with flowers:
The memory of the dead burns: shall we falter
In this great work of ours?

Nay, see us all join hands, the sage, the bard,
Warrior and artisan:
Easy is now that which was once so hard —
We threatened the Vatican.

Fed by the martyr's blood, bright torches quiver
Fanned by the breeze awhile,
Until at length, above the ancient river,
Shall fall th' accursed pile.

Thereafter Tiber's dark-haired nymph shall rove
'Mid moss-grown stones, and tell
The pilgrim how " these are the ruins of
A shame unspeakable."