The Poetical Works of George Barlow :: :: University of Virginia Library

Europe awaits a mandate! Strong and clear
If but the voice of nobler England sounds,
The wild beast, Death, will pause upon his rounds:
Mankind will hearken, starriest heaven will hear.
It is no hour for weak-lipped doubts or fear
For lo! the Sultan hunts with hell's black hounds.
While Emperors smile, blood drips from children's wounds
And horror heightens with the freshening year.

Stern hearts allied can stem the crimson stream.
Deep pity thrills the chivalry of France:
Mazzini's land is stirring and awake.
Others are moving. Shall we only dream?
Can no great passion lift us from our trance?
Immense the moment, and immense the stake.

II
A TRIPLE ALLIANCE

How grand a stroke for angels to record,—
That Milton's, Dante's, Hugo's warrior-lands
Joined ardent hearts and crime-subversive hands
And won for once Love's victory by the sword!
Beyond all dreams might be those Powers' reward.
From flower to flower a righteous deed expands:
Fresh fruits it bears, as year by year commands
And heavenlier sunlight round its path is poured.

France, England, Italy,—might not these attain
At last the ending of the blood-stained quest?
Might not the fleets that war with wave and breeze
Threaten the Turk, and in a twinkling gain
Through the near East a triumph for the West
Outtopping all old dull diplomacies?

III
TO THE POPE

Vicar of Christ, who holdest in thine hand
A sword far-reaching, keen to save or smite,
Rise up, be strong, shed forth thy Church's light.
The hosts of hell at thy supreme command
May scatter, and that blood-drenched Eastern land
May change its robes of red to robes of white.
Plead with divine authority. Invite
Kings to confer, make nations understand.

Thou art the leader of an army vast,
Vast on the earth, yet vaster in the skies.
On saints, not only upon the living, call.
Trumpet to trumpet echoing through the past
Will answer. Angel-legions will arise,
And Jericho's towers will totter, wall by wall.

IV
TO THE WOMEN OF ENGLAND

Queens of fair England, England of the rose,
The sunlit vale, the ocean-girdled shore,
The flower-sweet fields where no gaunt cannons roar,—
Queens of a land where love's heart may repose
Heedless of aught save the deep peace it knows,
The joys it brings, the heaven it can restore,—
Think of grim agony regnant, nor ignore
Measureless grief, most unexampled woes.

Vast is your power and vast your influence high.
Not yet your hearts have spoken as of old
When pity and love and your own souls were one.
Your prayers can summon, white-winged from the sky,
Spirits of force undreamed-of. Speak, be bold.
Banish this darkness, and relight the sun.

March, 1904.

University of Virginia Library

FOUR SONNETS ON MACEDONIA

I ENGLAND'S MOMENT

II A TRIPLE ALLIANCE

III TO THE POPE

IV TO THE WOMEN OF ENGLAND

I
ENGLAND'S MOMENT

II
A TRIPLE ALLIANCE

III
TO THE POPE

IV
TO THE WOMEN OF ENGLAND