Anti-Slavery Poems and Songs of Labor and Reform Part 37

II.

He woke. At once on heart and brain The present Terror rushed again; Clanked on his limbs the felon's chain He woke, to hear the church-tower tell Time's footfall on the conscious bell, And, shuddering, feel that clanging din His life's last hour had ushered in; To see within his prison-yard, Through the small window, iron barred, The gallows shadow rising dim Between the sunrise heaven and him; A horror in G.o.d's blessed air; A blackness in his morning light; Like some foul devil-altar there Built up by demon hands at night.

And, maddened by that evil sight, Dark, horrible, confused, and strange, A chaos of wild, weltering change, All power of check and guidance gone, Dizzy and blind, his mind swept on.

In vain he strove to breathe a prayer, In vain he turned the Holy Book, He only heard the gallows-stair Creak as the wind its timbers shook.

No dream for him of sin forgiven, While still that baleful spectre stood, With its hoa.r.s.e murmur, "Blood for Blood!"

Between him and the pitying Heaven.

III.

Low on his dungeon floor he knelt, And smote his breast, and on his chain, Whose iron clasp he always felt, His hot tears fell like rain; And near him, with the cold, calm look And tone of one whose formal part, Unwarmed, unsoftened of the heart, Is measured out by rule and book, With placid lip and tranquil blood, The hangman's ghostly ally stood, Blessing with solemn text and word The gallows-drop and strangling cord; Lending the sacred Gospel's awe And sanction to the crime of Law.

IV.

He saw the victim's tortured brow, The sweat of anguish starting there, The record of a nameless woe In the dim eye's imploring stare, Seen hideous through the long, damp hair,-- Fingers of ghastly skin and bone Working and writhing on the stone!

And heard, by mortal terror wrung From heaving breast and stiffened tongue, The choking sob and low hoa.r.s.e prayer; As o'er his half-crazed fancy came A vision of the eternal flame, Its smoking cloud of agonies, Its demon-worm that never dies, The everlasting rise and fall Of fire-waves round the infernal wall; While high above that dark red flood, Black, giant-like, the gallows stood; Two busy fiends attending there One with cold mocking rite and prayer, The other with impatient grasp, Tightening the death-rope's strangling clasp.

V.

The unfelt rite at length was done, The prayer unheard at length was said, An hour had pa.s.sed: the noonday sun Smote on the features of the dead!

And he who stood the doomed beside, Calm gauger of the swelling tide Of mortal agony and fear, Heeding with curious eye and ear Whate'er revealed the keen excess Of man's extremest wretchedness And who in that dark anguish saw An earnest of the victim's fate, The vengeful terrors of G.o.d's law, The kindlings of Eternal hate, The first drops of that fiery rain Which beats the dark red realm of pain, Did he uplift his earnest cries Against the crime of Law, which gave His brother to that fearful grave, Whereon Hope's moonlight never lies, And Faith's white blossoms never wave To the soft breath of Memory's sighs; Which sent a spirit marred and stained, By fiends of sin possessed, profaned, In madness and in blindness stark, Into the silent, unknown dark?

No, from the wild and shrinking dread, With which he saw the victim led Beneath the dark veil which divides Ever the living from the dead, And Nature's solemn secret hides, The man of prayer can only draw New reasons for his b.l.o.o.d.y law; New faith in staying Murder's hand By murder at that Law's command; New reverence for the gallows-rope, As human nature's latest hope; Last relic of the good old time, When Power found license for its crime, And held a writhing world in check By that fell cord about its neck; Stifled Sedition's rising shout, Choked the young breath of Freedom out, And timely checked the words which sprung From Heresy's forbidden tongue; While in its noose of terror bound, The Church its cherished union found, Conforming, on the Moslem plan, The motley-colored mind of man, Not by the Koran and the Sword, But by the Bible and the Cord.

VI.

O Thou at whose rebuke the grave Back to warm life its sleeper gave, Beneath whose sad and tearful glance The cold and changed countenance Broke the still horror of its trance, And, waking, saw with joy above, A brother's face of tenderest love; Thou, unto whom the blind and lame, The sorrowing and the sin-sick came, And from Thy very garment's hem Drew life and healing unto them, The burden of Thy holy faith Was love and life, not hate and death; Man's demon ministers of pain, The fiends of his revenge, were sent From thy pure Gospel's element To their dark home again.

Thy name is Love! What, then, is he, Who in that name the gallows rears, An awful altar built to Thee, With sacrifice of blood and tears?

Oh, once again Thy healing lay On the blind eyes which knew Thee not, And let the light of Thy pure day Melt in upon his darkened thought.

Soften his hard, cold heart, and show The power which in forbearance lies, And let him feel that mercy now Is better than old sacrifice.

VII.

As on the White Sea's charmed sh.o.r.e, The Pa.r.s.ee sees his holy hill (10) With dunnest smoke-clouds curtained o'er, Yet knows beneath them, evermore, The low, pale fire is quivering still; So, underneath its clouds of sin, The heart of man retaineth yet Gleams of its holy origin; And half-quenched stars that never set, Dim colors of its faded bow, And early beauty, linger there, And o'er its wasted desert blow Faint breathings of its morning air.

Oh, never yet upon the scroll Of the sin-stained, but priceless soul, Hath Heaven inscribed "Despair!"

Cast not the clouded gem away, Quench not the dim but living ray,-- My brother man, Beware!

With that deep voice which from the skies Forbade the Patriarch's sacrifice, G.o.d's angel cries, Forbear.

1843

SONGS OF LABOR.

DEDICATION.

Prefixed to the volume of which the group of six poems following this prelude const.i.tuted the first portion.

I WOULD the gift I offer here Might graces from thy favor take, And, seen through Friendship's atmosphere, On softened lines and coloring, wear The unaccustomed light of beauty, for thy sake.

Few leaves of Fancy's spring remain But what I have I give to thee, The o'er-sunned bloom of summer's plain, And paler flowers, the latter rain Calls from the westering slope of life's autumnal lea.

Above the fallen groves of green, Where youth's enchanted forest stood, Dry root and mossed trunk between, A sober after-growth is seen, As springs the pine where falls the gay-leafed maple wood!

Yet birds will sing, and breezes play Their leaf-harps in the sombre tree; And through the bleak and wintry day It keeps its steady green alway,-- So, even my after-thoughts may have a charm for thee.

Art's perfect forms no moral need, And beauty is its own excuse; But for the dull and flowerless weed Some healing virtue still must plead, And the rough ore must find its honors in its use.

So haply these, my simple lays Of homely toil, may serve to show The orchard bloom and ta.s.selled maize That skirt and gladden duty's ways, The unsung beauty hid life's common things below.

Haply from them the toiler, bent Above his forge or plough, may gain, A manlier spirit of content, And feel that life is wisest spent Where the strong working hand makes strong the working brain.

The doom which to the guilty pair Without the walls of Eden came, Transforming sinless ease to care And rugged toil, no more shall bear The burden of old crime, or mark of primal shame.

A blessing now, a curse no more; Since He, whose name we breathe with awe, The coa.r.s.e mechanic vesture wore, A poor man toiling with the poor, In labor, as in prayer, fulfilling the same law.

1850.

THE SHOEMAKERS.

Ho! workers of the old time styled The Gentle Craft of Leather Young brothers of the ancient guild, Stand forth once more together!

Call out again your long array, In the olden merry manner Once more, on gay St. Crispin's day, Fling out your blazoned banner!

Rap, rap! upon the well-worn stone How falls the polished hammer Rap, rap I the measured sound has grown A quick and merry clamor.

Now shape the sole! now deftly curl The glossy vamp around it, And bless the while the bright-eyed girl Whose gentle fingers bound it!

For you, along the Spanish main A hundred keels are ploughing; For you, the Indian on the plain His la.s.so-coil is throwing; For you, deep glens with hemlock dark The woodman's fire is lighting; For you, upon the oak's gray bark, The woodman's axe is smiting.

For you, from Carolina's pine The rosin-gum is stealing; For you, the dark-eyed Florentine Her silken skein is reeling; For you, the dizzy goatherd roams His rugged Alpine ledges; For you, round all her shepherd homes, Bloom England's th.o.r.n.y hedges.

The foremost still, by day or night, On moated mound or heather, Where'er the need of trampled right Brought toiling men together; Where the free burghers from the wall Defied the mail-clad master, Than yours, at Freedom's trumpet-call, No craftsmen rallied faster.

Let foplings sneer, let fools deride, Ye heed no idle scorner; Free hands and hearts are still your pride, And duty done, your honor.

Ye dare to trust, for honest fame, The jury Time empanels, And leave to truth each n.o.ble name Which glorifies your annals.

Thy songs, Hans Sachs, are living yet, In strong and hearty German; And Bloomfield's lay, and Gifford's wit, And patriot fame of Sherman; Still from his book, a mystic seer, The soul of Behmen teaches, And England's priestcraft shakes to hear Of Fox's leathern breeches.

The foot is yours; where'er it falls, It treads your well-wrought leather, On earthen floor, in marble halls, On carpet, or on heather.

Still there the sweetest charm is found Of matron grace or vestal's, As Hebe's foot bore nectar round Among the old celestials.

Rap, rap!--your stout and bluff brogan, With footsteps slow and weary, May wander where the sky's blue span Shuts down upon the prairie.

On Beauty's foot your slippers glance, By Saratoga's fountains, Or twinkle down the summer dance Beneath the Crystal Mountains!

The red brick to the mason's hand, The brown earth to the tiller's, The shoe in yours shall wealth command, Like fairy Cinderella's!

As they who shunned the household maid Beheld the crown upon her, So all shall see your toil repaid With hearth and home and honor.

Then let the toast be freely quaffed, In water cool and br.i.m.m.i.n.g,-- "All honor to the good old Craft, Its merry men and women!"

Call out again your long array, In the old time's pleasant manner Once more, on gay St. Crispin's day, Fling out his blazoned banner!