The Purple East A series of sonnets on England's desertion of Armenia by William Watson: With a frontispiece by G. F. Watts |
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 | The Purple East |  |
15
CRAVEN ENGLAND
Never, O craven England, nevermorePrate thou of generous effort, righteous aim!
Betrayer of a people, know thy shame!
Summer hath passed, and Autumn's threshing-floor
Been winnowed; Winter at Armenia's door
Snarls like a wolf; and still the sword and flame
Sleep not; thou only sleepest; and the same
Cry unto heaven ascends as heretofore;
The guiltless perish, and no man regards;
And sunk in ease, and lost to noble pride,
18
Thy sons forget what Truth and Honour meant,
And, day by day, to sit among the shards
Of broken faith are miserably content.
19
LAST WORD
And save to mourn, is there nought left to do,Nought ye can do, O sons of England? Yes:
Ye can arise, reclaim your manliness,
And flee the things that are unmaking you.
Still in your midst there dwells a remnant, who
Love not an unclean Art, a Stage no less
Unclean, a gibing and reviling Press,
A febrile Muse, and Fiction febrile too.
And they it is would pluck you from this slime
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With sloth that slays and torpor that is crime
Till ye can feel nought keenly, see nought plain.
Hearken their call, and heed, while yet is time,
Lest ye be lulled too deep to wake again.
| The Purple East | |