 | Ballads and Lyrics of Socialism: 1883-1908 |  |
I
I saw a people trampled on, oppressed,
With helpless hands, and eyes of light afraid,
With aching shoulders whereon burdens laid
By day and night choked hope and murdered rest;
A people sordid, sad, unloved, unblessed,
Whose shroud by their own hands was ever made,
Whose never-ending toil was only paid
By death-in-life—or death, of life's gifts best.
With helpless hands, and eyes of light afraid,
With aching shoulders whereon burdens laid
By day and night choked hope and murdered rest;
A people sordid, sad, unloved, unblessed,
Whose shroud by their own hands was ever made,
Whose never-ending toil was only paid
By death-in-life—or death, of life's gifts best.
‘What help,’ I cried, ‘for these whose hands are weak—
Too weak to hold the weapons they should wield;
Too weak to grasp a helping hand, or seek
With armed battalions to dispute the field,
And on the oppressors just revenge to wreak?’
Then—as I cried—the helper was revealed.
Too weak to hold the weapons they should wield;
Too weak to grasp a helping hand, or seek
With armed battalions to dispute the field,
And on the oppressors just revenge to wreak?’
Then—as I cried—the helper was revealed.
| Ballads and Lyrics of Socialism: 1883-1908 | |