John Boyle O'Reilly

“ Thou canst stand by the way ascending, as thy tyrant goes to the base:
The seeds of her death are in her and the signs in her cruel face.
On her darkened path lie the corpses of men, with whose blood her feet are red;
And the curses of ruined nations are a cloud above her head.
O Erin, fresh in the latest day, like a gem from a Syrian tomb,
The burial clay of the centuries has saved thy light in the gloom.
Thy hands may stretch to a kindred world: there is none that hates but one ”

“ All withered and wasted! and still—I love this falsest of men!"
Comfort? There is no comfort when the soul sees pain like a sun:
It is better to stare at the blinding truth: if it blind, one woe is done.
We cling to a coward hope, when hope has the seed of the pain:
If we tear out the roots of the grief, it will never torment again.
Ay, even if part of our life is lost, and the deep-laid nerves
That carry all joy to the heart are wounded or killed by the knife ”

“ Felt her breath, felt her cheek on my forehead—
Awake or asleep, she was here!
It was nothing—a dream? Strike that harp-string;
Again—still again—till it cries
In its uttermost treble—still strike it—
Ha? vibrant but silent! It dies—
It dies, just as she died. Go, listen—
That highest vibration is dumb.
Your sense, friend, too soon finds a limit
And answer, when mysteries come.
Truth speaks in the senseless, the spirit ”

“ When the next Spring blossoms had spoken their promise—smiled at the sun and lied;
The heart of the petals was withered to dust. Then, for duty, I trusted again;
For who should stand if God were to frown on the twice-told failures of men? ”

“ Shall pass like the flames that flash and die.
But forever the gain when the heart's convictions,
Rooted in nature the masses lead;
The cries of rebellion are benedictions
When the Word has flowered in a perfect Deed. ”

“ Not to read the song but ring it, like the sea-tone from a shell.
Sometimes, too, it comes and lingers round the strings all still and mute,
Till some lover's trembling fingers draw it living from the lute.
Still, our best is but a vision which a lightning-flash illumes,
Just a gleam of life elysian flung across the voiceless glooms.
Why should gleams perplex and move us? Must the soul still upward grow
To the beauty far above us and the songs no sense may know? ”

“ Creeps slow round the world, till the feet of the throne
Are lapped by the waves that shall seethe and ride
Where the titles are gulfed and the shields overblown.
Our Kings are the same as the Kings of old.
But a Man stands up where there crouched a clown;
The Evil shall die when his hand grows bold,
And the touch of the People is laid on the Crown! ”

“ No less than He can make us heed or pause:
Self-seekers we, too busy or too weak
To search beyond our daily lives and laws.
From things occult our earth-turned eyes rebel;
No sound of Destiny can reach our ears;
We have no time for dreaming Hark! a knell—
A knell at midnight! All the nation hears!
A second grievous throb! The dreamers wake—
The merchant's soul forgets his goods and ships;
The weary workmen from their slumbers break;
The women raise their eyes with quivering lips ”

“ Then round his breast, like the scarf of his love,
He tied the colors his heart above,
And plunged in his armor into the tide,
And there, in his dress of honor, died.
"Where are the lessons your kinglings teach?
And what is text of your proud commanders?
Out of the centuries, heroes reach
"With the scroll of a deed, with the word of a story,
Of one man's truth and of all men's glory. ”

“ God makes a poet: touches soul and sight,
And lips and heart, and sends him forth to sing;
His fellows hearing, own the true birthright,
And crown him daily with the love they bring.
The king a lord makes, by a parchment leaf ”

“ When human right seems doomed to dissolution,
And Hope itself is wrung with mortal pains;
When Christ is harnessed to the landlord's burden;
His truth to make men free a thing of scorn;
God hears the cry, and sends the mystic guerdon,—
Earth thrills and throes—another Queen is born!
O weak she comes, a child and not a woman ”

“ I prefer to trust God for my living than plod for my bread at a master's hand.
A man's higher being is knowing and seeing, not having and toiling for more;
In the senses and soul is the joy of control, not in pride or luxurious store. ”

“ But e'en here, amidst the markets, there are things they dare not prize;
Dollars hide their sordid faces when they meet anointed eyes.
Lovers do not speak with jewels—flowers alone can plead for them;
And one fragrant memory cherished is far dearer than a gem.
Statesmen steer the nation safely; artists pass the burning test;
And their country pays them proudly with a ribbon at the breast. ”

“ AMERICA. [1]
Nor War nor Peace, forever, old and young,
But Strength my theme, whose song is yet unsung,
The People's Strength, the deep alluring dream
Of truths that seethe below the truths that seem. ”

“ The heroes who die unknown, and the weak who are chained and scourged by the strong."
And the people smile at the death- word, for the mystic voice is clear :
"The Singer who lived is always alive: we hearken and always hear!" ”

“ The workman is proud of his home's dear name as the richest man on the city streets.
God pity them all ! God pity the worst! for the worst are reckless, and need it most:
When we trace the causes why lives are curst with the criminal taint, let no man boast:
The race is not run with an equal chance: the poor man's son carries double weight;
Who have not, are tempted; inheritance is a blight or a blessing of man's estate. ”

“ Till a noble Purpose smites them and melts them into one.
While the sands are free, O Tyrants! like the wind are your steel and speech;
Your brute-force crushes a legion, but a soul it can never reach. ”

“ Who dared to be traitor to Union when Union was traitor to Right!
"Fanatic!" the insects hissed, till he taught them to understand
That the highest crime may be written in the highest law of the land.
"Disturber" and "Dreamer" the Philistines cried when he preached an ideal creed,
Till they learned that the men who have changed the world with the world have disagreed ”

“ What is good to win must be good to keep, else the virtue dies on the topmost stair;
When the winners can keep their golden prize, still darker the day of the laboring poor:
The strong and the selfish are sure to rise, while the simple and generous die obscure. ”

“ For a dreamer lives forever,
And a thinker dies in a day.
I can feel no pride, but pity
For the burdens the rich endure;
There is nothing sweet in the city
But the patient lives of the poor. ”

“ In the crowded hives of men;
Heart-weary of building and spoiling,
And spoiling and building again.
And I long for the dear old river,
Where I dreamed my youth away;
For a dreamer lives forever,
And a toiler dies in a day. ”

“ But men are the makers of systems: so, the cure will come if we own the wrong.
It will come in peace if the man-right lead; it will sweep in storm if it be denied:
The law to bring justice is always decreed ”

“ And darkness and danger to sailors' lives;
But the bird had its tender bosom pressed
On the glass where at last it dashed its breast.
The light only flickered, the brighter to glow;
But the bird lay dead on the rocks below. ”

“ The races that band for plunder are the mud of the human stream.
The base and the coward and sordid, without an unselfish gleam.
It is mud that unites; but the sand is free—ay, every grain is free. ”

“ As your past was for Freedom, so be your hereafter;
And through all your coming years
May no weak race be wronged, and no strong robber feared;
To oppressors grow hateful, to slaves more endeared ”

“ That hoards had rights while human souls had none.
Then all things changed their object and relation;
Commerce instead of Nature—Progress instead of Men;
The world became a monstrous corporation. ”

“ When a friend in need is a friend in want;
Where the only aim is to keep afloat.
And a brother may drown with a cry in his throat.
Oh, I long for the glow of a kindly heart and the grasp of a friendly hand.
And I'd rather live in Bohemia than in any other land. ”

“ And each new decade must have new men to determine its liberty.
Mankind is a marching army, with a broadening front the while:
Shall it crowd its bulk on the farm-paths, or clear to the outward file? ”

“ Till the smile leaves his mouth, and the ring leaves his laugh.
And he shirks the bright headache you ask him to quaff;
He grows formal with men, and with women polite,
And distrustful of both when they're out of his sight ”

“ And I said : "My friend, have you time to spend to tell me what makes you glad?"
"Oh, ay, my lad," with a smile; "I'm glad that I'm old, yet am never sad!"
"But why?" said I; and his merry eye made answer as much as his tongue;
"Because," said he, "I am poor and free who was rich and a slave when young.
There is naught but age can allay the rage of the passions that rule men's lives ”

“ Thy Country—bowed in prayer and tear—
For North and South—above thy bier!
For North and South! Soldier grim,
The broken ones to weep for him
Who broke them! He whose terrors blazed
In smoking harvests, cities razed ”

“ In the forum stand they proudly, take their prizes from the pries:
Little wreaths of pine and parsley on their naked temples pressed!
We in later days are lower? When a manful stroke is made.
We must raise a purse to pay it—making manliness a trade. ”

“ The organized charity, scrimped and iced,
In the name of a cautious, statistical Christ; ”

“ Each hill-topped foible in the sunset glowed.
Obscuring vales where rivered virtues flowed.
Reproof became reproach, till common grew
The captious word at every fault I knew.
He smiled upon the censorship, and bore
With patient love the touch that wounded sore ”

“ They are early helpers in this poor place, and the infant must often nurse the mother.
Come up those stairs where the little ones went: five flights they groped and climbed in the dark;
There are dozens of homes on the steep ascent, and homes that are filled with children—hark! ”

“ Thread by thread the patient hand
Must untwine ere free we stand.
As we builded, stone by stone,
We must toil unhelped, alone,
Till the wall is overthrown.
But remember, as we try,
Lighter every test goes by ”

“ Their justice force, their whole achievement crude.
"With men the old are wise: why change the rule
When nations speak, and send the old to school?
Respect the past for all the good it knew:
Give noble lives and struggling truths their due ”