Part 4 (1/2)

On Adams street and Jefferson-- Flames coming up from the ground!

On Jackson street and Was.h.i.+ngton-- Flames coming up from the ground!

And why, until the dawning sun Are flames coming up from the ground?

Because, through drowsy Springfield sped This red-skin queen, with feathered head, With winds and stars, that pay her court And leaping beasts, that make her sport; Because, gray Europe's rags august She tramples in the dust; Because we are her fields of corn; Because our fires are all reborn From her bosom's deathless embers, Flaming As she remembers The springtime And Virginia, Our Mother, Pocahontas.

III

We here renounce our Saxon blood.

Tomorrow's hopes, an April flood Come roaring in. The newest race Is born of her resilient grace.

We here renounce our Teuton pride: Our Norse and Slavic boasts have died: Italian dreams are swept away, And Celtic feuds are lost today....

She sings of lilacs, maples, wheat, Her own soil sings beneath her feet, Of springtime And Virginia, Our Mother, Pocahontas.

Concerning Emperors

I. G.o.d Send the Regicide

Would that the lying rulers of the world Were brought to block for tyrannies abhorred.

Would that the sword of Cromwell and the Lord, The sword of Joshua and Gideon, Hewed hip and thigh the hosts of Midian.

G.o.d send that ironside ere tomorrow's sun; Let Gabriel and Michael with him ride.

G.o.d send the Regicide.

II. A Colloquial Reply: To Any Newsboy

If you lay for Iago at the stage door with a brick You have missed the moral of the play.

He will have a midnight supper with Oth.e.l.lo and his wife.

They will chirp together and be gay.

But the things Iago stands for must go down into the dust: Lying and suspicion and conspiracy and l.u.s.t.

And I cannot hate the Kaiser (I hope you understand.) Yet I chase the thing he stands for with a brickbat in my hand.

Niagara

I

Within the town of Buffalo Are prosy men with leaden eyes.

Like ants they worry to and fro, (Important men, in Buffalo.) But only twenty miles away A deathless glory is at play: Niagara, Niagara.

The women buy their lace and cry:-- ”O such a delicate design,”