 | The collected works of Ambrose Bierce |  |
LUCIFER OF THE TORCH
O Reverend Ravlin, once with sounding lungYou shook the bloody banner of your tongue,
Urged all the fiery boycotters afield
And swore you'd rather see them die than yield.
Alas, how brief the time, how great the change!—
Your dogs of war are ailing all of mange;
The loose leash dangles from your finger-tips,
But the loud “havoc” dies upon your lips.
No spirit animates your feeble clay—
You'd rather yield than even run away.
In vain McGlashan labors to inspire
99
The light of battle's faded from your face—
You keep the peace, John Chinaman his place.
O Ravlin, what cold water, thrown by whom,
Upon the kindling Boycott's ruddy bloom,
Has slaked your parching blood-thirst and allayed
The flash and shimmer of your lingual blade?
Your salary—your salary's unpaid!
In the old days, when Christ with scourges drave
The Ravlins headlong from the Temple's nave,
Each bore upon his pelt the mark divine—
The Boycott's red authenticating sign.
Birth-marked forever in surviving hurts,
Glowing and smarting underneath their shirts,
Successive Ravlins have revenged their shame
By blowing every coal and flinging flame.
And you, the latest (may you be the last!)
Endorsed with that hereditary, vast
And monstrous rubric, would the feud prolong,
Save that cupidity forbids the wrong.
In strife you preferably pass your days—
But brawl no moment longer than it pays.
By shouting when no more you can incite
The dogs to put the timid sheep to flight
To load, for you, the brambles with their fleece,
You cackle concord to congenial geese,
Put pinches of goodwill upon their tails
And pluck them with a touch that never fails.
| The collected works of Ambrose Bierce | |