Collected Works (Vol. II)

AHAB 123 The blood alike of man and beast The worship of each God demands. All priests are greedy—gold and feast Pour from the poor folk to their hands. The doubtful power from heaven to strike The levin bolt they claim alike. I take no heed of trickery played By cunning mad Elijah’s skill, When the great test of strength was made On Carmel’s melancholy hill, And on the altar-stone the liar Cried ‘‘ Water,” and poured forth Greek fire ! Then while the fools peer heavenward, Even as he prays, to see the skies Vomit the flash, his furtive sword Fast to the flinty altar flies. Whoof! the wild blaze assures the clods Jehovah is the God of gods ! Nor do I set peculiar store By tricks twin-born to this they show When, with well-simulated lore Of learning, Baal’s great hierarchs go Into the gold god’s graven shell And moan the ambiguous oracle. In my own inmost heart I feel, Deep as a pearl in seas of Ind, A vision, keen as tempered steel, Lofty and holy as the wind, And brighter than the living sun : If these be gods, then there is none ! Baal and Jehovah, Ashtoreth And Chemosh and these Elohim, Life’s pandars in the brothel, Death! Cloudy imaginings, a dream Built up of fear and words and woe. All, all my soul must overthrow. For these are devils, nothing doubt ! Yet nought should trouble me: I see My folk secure from foes without, Worship in peace and amity Baal and Jehovah, sects appeased By peace assured and wealth increased. Yet am [ troubled. Doubt exists And absolute proof recoils before me. Truth veils herself in awful mists, And darkness wakens, rolling o’er me When I approach the dreadful shrine, In my own soul, of the divine. And what cries laughing Jezebel? Golden and fragrant as the morn, Painted like flames adorning Hell, Passions and mysteries outworn, Ever enchanting, ever wise, And terror in her wondrous eyes ! Her fascination steals my strength, Her luxury lures me as she comes ; Reaches her length against my length, And breaks my spirit ; life succumbs— A nameless avatar of death Incarnate in her burning breath. I know her gorgeous raiment folded In snaky subtle draperies, All stalwart captains mighty-moulded To lure within her sorceries, Within her bed—and I, who love, See, and am silent, and approve! Strange! Who shall call the potter knave Who moulds a vessel to his will? One, if he choose, a black-browed slave: One, if he choose, a thing of ill, Writhing, misshapen, footless, cruel: One, like a carved Assyrian jewel? Shame on the potter heavy sit, If he revenge his own poor skill That marred a work by lack of wit, By heaping infamy and ill On the already ruined clay. Shame on the potter, then, I say ! But what cries laughing Jezebel? Scornful of me as all her lovers, More scornful as we love her well ! ‘*Good king, this rage of doubt discovers The long-hid secret! All thy mind A little shadow lurks behind.”