The Poems of Emma Lazarus Volume II Part 13

7. The herdsman of Canaan and the seed of Jerusalem's royal shepherd renew their youth amid the pastoral plains of Texas and the golden valleys of the Sierras.

VI. THE PROPHET.

1. Moses Ben Maimon lifting his perpetual lamp over the path of the perplexed;

2. Hallevi, the honey-tongued poet, wakening amid the silent ruins of Zion the sleeping lyre of David;

3. Moses, the wise son of Mendel, who made the Ghetto ill.u.s.trious;

4. Abarbanel, the counselor of kings; Alcharisi, the exquisite singer; Ibn Ezra, the perfect old man; Gabirol, the tragic seer;

5. Heine, the enchanted magician, the heartbroken jester;

6. Yea, and the century-crowned patriarch whose bounty engirdles the globe;--

7. These need no wreath and no trumpet; like perennial asphodel blossoms, their fame, their glory resounds like the brazen-throated cornet.

8. But thou--hast thou faith in the fortune of Israel? Wouldst thou lighten the anguish of Jacob?

9. Then shalt thou take the hand of yonder caftaned wretch with flowing curls and gold-pierced ears;

10. Who crawls blinking forth from the loathsome recesses of the Jewry;

11. Nerveless his fingers, puny his frame; haunted by the bat-like phantoms of superst.i.tion is his brain.

12. Thou shalt say to the bigot, "My Brother," and to the creature of darkness, "My Friend."

13. And thy heart shall spend itself in fountains of love upon the ignorant, the coa.r.s.e, and the abject.

14. Then in the obscurity thou shalt hear a rush of wings, thine eyes shall be bitten with pungent smoke.

15. And close against thy quivering lips shall be pressed the live coal wherewith the Seraphim brand the Prophets.

VII. CHRYSALIS.

1. Long, long has the Orient-Jew spun around his helplessness the cunningly enmeshed web of Talmud and Kabbala.

2. Imprisoned in dark corners of misery and oppression, closely he drew about him the dust-gray filaments, soft as silk and stubborn as steel, until he lay death-stiffened in mummied seclusion.

3. And the world has named him an ugly worm, shunning the blessed daylight.

4. But when the emanc.i.p.ating springtide breathes wholesome, quickening airs, when the Sun of Love shines out with cordial fires, lo, the Soul of Israel bursts her cobweb sheath, and flies forth attired in the winged beauty of immortality.

TO CARMEN SYLVA.

Oh, that the golden lyre divine Whence David smote flame-tones were mine!

Oh, that the silent harp which hung Untuned, unstrung, Upon the willows by the river, Would throb beneath my touch and quiver With the old song-enchanted spell Of Israel!

Oh, that the large prophetic Voice Would make my reed-piped throat its choice!

All ears should p.r.i.c.k, all hearts should spring, To hear me sing The burden of the isles, the word a.s.syria knew, Damascus heard, When, like the wind, while cedars shake, Isaiah spake.

For I would frame a song to-day Winged like a bird to cleave its way O'er land and sea that spread between, To where a Queen Sits with a triple coronet.

Genius and Sorrow both have set Their diadems above the gold-- A Queen three-fold!

To her the forest lent its lyre, Hers are the sylvan dews, the fire Of Orient suns, the mist-wreathed gleams Of mountain streams.

She, the imperial Rhine's own child, Takes to her heart the wood-nymph wild, The gypsy Pelech, and the wide, White Danube's tide.

She who beside an infant's bier Long since resigned all hope to hear The sacred name of "Mother" bless Her childlessness, Now from a people's sole acclaim Receives the heart-vibrating name, And "Mother, Mother, Mother!" fills The echoing hills.

Yet who is he who pines apart, Estranged from that maternal heart, Ungraced, unfriended, and forlorn, The b.u.t.t of scorn?

An alien in his land of birth, An outcast from his brethren's earth, Albeit with theirs his blood mixed well When Plevna fell?

When all Roumania's chains were riven, When unto all his sons was given The hero's glorious reward, Reaped by the sword,-- Wherefore was this poor thrall, whose chains Hung heaviest, within whose veins The oldest blood of freedom streamed, Still unredeemed?

O Mother, Poet, Queen in one!

Pity and save--he is thy son.

For poet David's sake, the king Of all who sing; For thine own people's sake who share His law, his truth, his praise, his prayer; For his sake who was sacrificed-- His brother--Christ!

THE DANCE TO DEATH;

A Historical Tragedy in Five Acts.

This play is dedicated, in profound veneration and respect, to the memory of George Eliot, the ill.u.s.trious writer, who did most among the artists of our day towards elevating and enn.o.bling the spirit of Jewish nationality.