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 | Voices and visions |  |
167
LINCOLN LOQUITUR
I
Sternly the spirit of Lincoln speaks from the vague inane:‘Hear me and heed, O my children, me for the love of you slain!
Whence is the wild war-madness, thralling your brains and souls?
Where have your footsteps wandered, scornful of wisdom's goals?
Was it for this that my starlight glittered while hurricanes raved?
Was it for this that I served you? Was it for this that I saved?
How should your impulse and purport lapse to such paltrier gain?
Hear me and heed, O my children, me for the love of you slain!
II
‘When amid frenzies of faction shuddered and shouted our land,Slavery's curse from its annals tore I with terrible hand.
Postured sublimely unselfish, earth should envisage at last
You, the one perfect Republic, found after venturings vast.
168
Fervid with dreams of your future, high as my haughtiest hope.
Such was your prophesied splendour. ... Weak does it falter and wane?
Hear me and heed, O my children, me for the love of you slain!
III
‘What of the bondsmen I rescued? Can ye so lightly forgetWrong that of old was their durance, wrong that to-day is your debt?
These from the blight of their bondage have ye upraised so supreme
That in remote isles of ocean others ye fain would redeem?
Yonder, unbarred from debasement, scourged by the lashes of caste,
Look to your true “Filipinos,” heirs of an infamous past!
Let not your lips laud as martyr him whom your actions profane;
Hear me and heed, O my children, me for the love of you slain!’
September 1899.
| Voices and visions | |