Classic Poem

Six men drove up to his house at midnight, and woke the poor woman who kept it,
And asked her: “Where is the man who spoke against war and insulted the army?”
And the old woman took fear of the men and the hour, and showed them the room where he slept,
And when they made sure it was he whom they wanted, they dragged him out of his bed with blows, tho' he was willing to walk,
And they fastened his hands on his back, and they drove him across the black night,
And there was no moon and no star and not any visible thing, and even the faces of the men were eaten with leprosy of the dark, for they were masked with black shame,
And nothing showed in the gloom save the glow of his eyes and the flame of his soul that scorched the face of Death.


Now he is dead, but now that he is dead is the door of your dungeon faster, O money changers and scribes, and priests, and masters of slaves?
Are men now readier to die for you without asking the wherefore of the slaughter?
Shall now the pent-up spirit no longer connive with the sun against your midnight?
And are we now all reconciled to your rule, and are you safer and we humbler, and is the night eternal and the day forever blotted out of the skies,
And all blind yesterdays risen, and all tomorrows entombed,
And listen forever to one word of shame and subjection,
And leave the plough in the furrow, the trowel on the wall, the hammer on the anvil, and the heart of the race on the knees of screaming women, and the future of the race in the hands of babbling children,
And yoke on your shoulders the halter of hatred and fury,
And dash head-down against the bastions of folly,
Because a colored cloth waves in the air, because a drum beats in the street,
Because six men have promised you a piece of ribbon on your coat, a carved tablet on a wall and your name in a list bordered with black?
Shall you, then, be forever the stewards of death, when life waits for you like a bride?
Ah, no, brothers, not for this did our mothers shriek with pain and delight when we tore their flanks with our first cry;
Not for this were we given command of the beasts,
Not with blood but with sweat were we bidden to achieve our salvation.
Behold! I announce now to you great tidings of joy,
For if your hands that are gathered in sheaves for the sickle of war unite as a bouquet of flowers between the warm breasts of peace,
Because of six faceless men and ten feet of rope and one corpse dangling unseen in the blackness under a railroad trestle?
No, I say, no! It swings like a terrible pendulum that shall soon come out a mad tocsin and call the red cock to the crowing.
No, I say, no, for someone will bear witness of this to the dawn,
Someone will stand straight and fearless tomorrow between the armed hosts of your slaves, and shout to them the challenge of that silence you could not break.


“Brothers”—he will shout to them—“are you then, the God-born, reduced to a mute of dogs,
That you will rush to the hunt of your kin at the blowing of a horn
Brothers, have then the centuries that created new suns in the heaven gouged out the eyes of your soul,
That you should wallow in your blood like swine,
That you should squirm like rats in carrion,
That you, who astonished the eagles, should beat blindly about the night of murder like bats?
Are you, brothers, who were meant to scale the stars, forever to crouch before a footstool,
Freedom will come without any blows save the hammers on the chains of your wrist, and the picks on the walls of your jails!

Arise, and against every hand jeweled with the rubies of murder,
Against every foul smell of the earth,
Against every mouth that sneers at the tears of mercy,
Against every head that a footstool raises over your head,
Against every word that was written before this was said,
Against every happiness that never knew sorrow,
And every glory that never knew love and sweat,
Against silence and death, and fear,
Arise with a mighty roar!
Arise and declare your war;
For the world of dawn is blowing,
For the eyes of the East are glowing,
For the lark is up and the cock is crowing,
And the day of judgment is here!”