|
The City of Lies
Published in the Agnostic Journal London, England 11 August 1906 (page 87)
Once, man in ignorance did raise A fragile tower to the skies, Seeking to leave the fettered ways Of a sad world of lies; He built it high, with stone and mud, Mixing the mortar with his blood, His sorrows, and his sighs.
The sun shone on its gilded spire, A beck'ning finger to the throng; Deep from its precincts did suspire, A mystic siren song. The clanging of its noisy bell, Drove airy devils into hell, Seeking to right the wrong.
Around the battlements were raised, A mighty town, both fair and strong; And he that owned the tower gazed Upon the fickle throng; But in the turret from on high, He caught the laugh, but lost the sigh, Of builders' lash and thong.
Into a city the town grew; And to the city her roses and her rue, Where midst her roses and her rue, A limpid stream she purled. But soon flowing round the tower, She tore up every beauteous flower, Which down her eddies whirled.
Then, from man's blood the star-blind seer, Extracted gold a thousand years; And threw his spells both far and near, Warping the mind with fears, Till at the clink of gold man's brain Sank, as the suns midst drizzling rain; The rain of human tears.
Red blushed the world with blood and gain; The jarring door of Death did ope, Through which echoed the shrieks of pain, The creak of wheel and rope: And as the day became more dim, He bid the nations worship him, Their mystic only hope.
Fast fell the night dismal and dark, Alone the moon shone dim and red; The night-jar shrieked where once the lark Had sung, and darkness led The west into a land where wan, Alone the eastern crescent shone, As vice sought virtue's bed.
But as the moon, whose borrowed light Reflecting glories of the East, Struck with a ray the tower's might; Then swore the blood drunk's beast: To slay the moon, demented fool, Ten thousand princes as his tool Became a vulture's feast.
The seer looked out, and cursed, and swore; Divorced his soul and took to bed, As knights fall fast, the wretched whore Who on their corpses fed. Then groaned the world for all the best Were dead; and in their place was dressed A crimson woman red.
"Son of the Moor, pale prince divine," Was shouted loud but yet some thought As parting clouds let stars forth shine, Can sins be sold and bought Then as the thunder clouds return, Flash lightnings; so the seer did burn The starry light they sought.
Roll thunder till the crack of doom, Raging, and roaring, o'er the Earth; Shrieking with pain from out the womb Of the harlot leapt Death Of Soul, of Love, of Faith, of Fire; A worthy offspring of his sire, Upon whose lips froze mirth.
Far spent in travail was the night; Unnatural vice, incestuous lust, Shook to its base the towers might; And eaten deep with rust, As some worn sword smiting would yield, A thousand fragments to the shield, It crumbled into dust.
And as it fell, across the West Sped the first rays of waking morn; Apollo kissed Aurora's breast, And a new light was born. Then foul the Vulture of the night, Rose for a space a vampire kite, To suck the blood of Dawn.
But arrows sharp the sons of Dawn Drew from Truth's quiver and let fly, Until the Vampire's heart was torn, And to the ground it fell to die: A living corpse, a living death, A foul excrescence without breath, A putrid rotting lie.
Still by the carcass of itself A shiv'ring wraith sits on a clod; Shrieking it asks a little pelf, Crawling where once it trod: It sucks the strength still of the frail, And makes life hideous with its wail To rouse a dying God.
|