The Complete Poetical Works of Robert Buchanan :: :: University of Virginia Library

First to the front a shrouded figure crept,
Gazed upon Jesus, hid his face, and wept,
Saying, ‘What would ye? Wherefore am I taken
Out of the dark grave where I slept forsaken,
Forgetting all my heritage of woe?’

‘What Soul art thou?’

‘One Judas, named also
Iscariot.’

‘Know'st thou the Accused?’

‘Aye me.
In sooth I know him, to my misery!
I followed him, and I believed for long
That he was God indeed, serene and strong;
Then with an eager hunger famishing
To see his Kingdom and to hail him King,
I did betray him, thinking “When he stands
Bound and condemn'd in the oppressor's hands,
When Death comes near to drink his holy breath,
He will put forth his power and vanquish Death!”
But when I saw him conquer'd, crucified,
I hid my face in shame and crept aside,
And in the Potter's Field myself I hung.’

‘Now answer! Was thy spirit consciencestung?
Having betrayed him, wherefore didst thou die?’

‘Because I knew his promise was a lie,
Because I knew the Man whom I had slain
Was not Messiah—Now, let me sleep again!’

‘Pass by. The next!’

Forth stept before their sight
A form so old, so wan and hoary white,
It seem'd another Christ, as old, as sad;
And he in antique raiment too was clad,
Ragged and wild and his white hair was strewn
Like snow around him 'neath the wintry Moon,
And by his side a lean she-bear there ran,
Gentle and tame uplooking at the man
With piteous bleats, while his thin hand was spread
With touch as chill as ice upon its head.
When on the Accused this old man turned his eyes
He shook and would have fled with feeble cries,
But a hand held him. Shivering and afraid,
He shrank and gazed upon the ground, but stayed.

‘Thy name?’

‘Ahasuerus. Far away
Beyond the changes of the night and day,

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In the bleak regions of the Frozen Zone,
Lit with auroral beams I roamed alone,
When a voice called me, and behold I came.

‘Look on the Accused. Know st thou his Form and Name?’

‘Alack, I know him, as I know my doom—
To wander o'er the world without a tomb,
Alone, unpitied, hopeless, weak and wild . . .
Before my door I stood with wife and child
That weary moment when they led him by,
Bearing his heavy Cross of Wood, to die.
He would have rested at my dwelling-place,
But knowing him blasphemer, branded base,
Taking the name of God in vain, I cried,
“If thou art God, now cast thy Cross aside,
And take thy Throne—if thou hast lied pass on!”
He turned on me his face all woe-begone,
And murmur'd faintly, as he crawl'd away,
“Thou shalt not rest until my Judgment Day;
Till then walk on from sleepless year to year!”
He spake. That doom pursued me. I am here.’

‘Take comfort, brother. Tho' thy wrongs are deep,
When this same Jew is judgèd thou shalt sleep.
Pass by.’

With feeble moan and weary pace
He went. Another stept into his place.

‘Thou?’
‘Pilate, to whose Roman judgment seat
They brought this Jew, casting him at my feet
And clamouring for his life. I smiled to see
So mad a thing usurping sovereignty,
And said, “O Jews, if so ye list, fulfil
The law, and spare or slay him as ye will—
The Roman wars not with such foes as he—
Upon your heads, not mine, this deed shall be.’
And ere to shameful Death the man was borne,
Iturned aside and washed my hands in scorn
Of them and him!’

‘Pass on!’

The Roman cast
One pitying look upon the Jew, and pass'd
Into the darkness.—As he sank from sight
There came in pale procession thro' the night
Great Phantoms who the imperial robe did wear,
Sceptre in hand, and bayleaves in the hair,
Each lewd and horrible and infamous,
A monster, yet a man: Tiberius,
Sejanus, and the rest; and last of all
Came one who trode the earth with light foot-fall,
And sang with shrill voice to a golden lute;
And lo! a woman's robe from head to foot
Enwrapt him, and his face was sickly white
With nameless infamies of lewd delight,
And on his beardless cheeks mine eyes could see
The hideous crimson paint of harlotry,
While, in a voice as any eunuch's shrill,
He cried:

‘This Jew, their Christ, lay cold and still
Within his Sepulchre, and slept supine,
While I, the Antichrist, pour'd blood like wine
To appease my parasites and paramours!
Nay, more, before my shining palace-doors
And round the gardens of the feast, I placed
The naked forms of men and maidens chaste
Who worshipt him, and lit the same to be
The living torches of my revelry;
And all in vain, thus stript and sacrificed,
They called on Christ to conquer Antichrist!
In the amphitheatre I sat and smiled
On strong men martyred and on maids defiled;
Then clad myselfin skins of beasts, and flew
To glut my lechery in all men's view,
And ravenous-claw'd my bestial lust I fed
On shuddering flesh of virgins ravishèd.
And yet he rose not! Still and stark he lay.
God-like I reign'd, with a god's power to slay,
Shame, sadden, gladden. To the old Gods I sang
My triumph song that thro' the nations rang
While Rome was burning! On my mother's womb
I thrust the impious heel! Yet from his tomb

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This Jesus stirred not! God-like still, I died
By mine own hand, not shamed and crucified
As he, this Jew, had been!—He lives, ye say?
Poor Phantom of the Cross, forlorn and grey,
What shall his life avail? His day hath fled,
But other Antichrists uplift the head
And laugh, and cry “The reign of Christ is o'er!
Make merry!”—Yea, the Earth is his no more,
His Heaven a Dream, and where he wrought in vain
The harlot and the sodomite still reign!’

He spake, and with a shrill and cruel cry
Followed his brethren; in his track crept by
Pale ghostly Phantoms filleted or crown'd,
Imperial harlots with their zones unbound,
And haggard children clutch'd yet uncaress'd,
Rolling blind eyes and fighting for the breast;
And after these a throng of martyrs slain,
Bloody and maim'd and worn, who wail'd in pain,
Fixing their piteous eyes on that pale Jew.

Crowd after crowd they pass'd, and passing threw
A curse or prayer on Him who anguish'd there
Crown'd with the calm of a divine despair,
And one by one He mark'd them come and go
While down His wrinkled cheeks deep-sunk in woe
The salt tears ran, and ever and anon
He hid His face so weary and woe-begone,
Or peering vaguely up into the Night
Pressèd His skinny hands together tight
And moan'd unto Himself!