Poetry Archives

1. Daylong I brooded upon the Passion of Israel.
2. I saw him bound to the wheel, nailed to the cross, cut off by
the sword, burned at the stake, tossed into the seas.
3. And always the patient, resolute, martyr face arose in silent
rebuke and defiance.
4. A Prophet with four eyes; wide gazed the orbs of the spirit
above the sleeping eyelids of the senses.
5. A Poet, who plucked from his bosom the quivering heart and
fashioned it into a lyre.
6. A placid-browed Sage, uplifted from earth in celestial
meditation.
7. These I saw, with princes and people in their train; the
monumental dead and the standard-bearers of the future.
8. And suddenly I heard a burst of mocking laughter, and turning, I
beheld the shuffling gait, the ignominious features, the sordid mask
of the son of the Ghetto.