The Jew in America
WING thee, my song, and in majestic flight
Grace with fair melody the words I write;
That they, in some not too unworthy strain,
With pride and plaint, of glory tell and pain;
Say in what early dawn of history
High fate enmeshed our footsteps-made us be
The burdened bearers of a word sublime-
The portent and the amulet of time.
For that far vale, the cradle and the grave,-
Where we behold God and the world He gave,—
We have come hither for that high word's sake,
Bound each to each with bonds that naught could
break.
The golden thread along the paths we trod :: Gleamed bright from daily contact with our God— Through labyrinthine gloom of age on age
We knew its radiance as our heritage,
And though in strange, far lands enforced to roam, The broad earth held for us no alien home.
Spain saw us-Holland-and th' intrepid crew
Of the famed caravel whose captain knew
Where sky and ocean melted in the west.
A new world waited for his wondrous quest.
A new world—with great portals far outflung-
Holding a hope more sweet than time had sung,
To which the Jew, of life's high quest a part,
A pilgrim came, the Torah in his heart.
Of his endeavor, how he thrived and came
To give new glory to his ancient name
And wore as diadem the thread of gold,
On many a page the chronicler has told.
A land of promise, and fulfilment too;
Where on a sudden olden dreams came true.
Man was man's equal-unto every race
The path was levelled to the highest place.
Here grew we part of an ennobled state,
Gave and won honor, sat among the great,
And saw unfolding to our 'raptured view
The day long prayed for by the patient Jew.
Pause thou, my song, that soarest proud and high,
Pause thou awhile, lest some far-echoed cry
Reverberating through the caves of time
Destroy the structure of thy vaulting rhyme.
A pale cadaver with lack-lustre eyes,
Touches the harp and stills its melodies.
Russia, thy name embitters history,
And in the ages that are yet to be,
A symbol thou for all the world holds worst-
Abhorred of heaven, by mankind accursed.
Prophetic made by frenzy of our grief,
By miseries that mount beyond belief,
We thee consign to be the scorn of time,
Shackled forever to earth's blackest crime.
The long forefinger of the future years
Shall point thee out the fountain-head of tears;
Nor ocean's waters may efface the stain
Branded in blood on thee-the brand of Cain!
Fain turns my song unto some fairer note-
We guard a promise voiced in days remote,
The words of prophets, and our deathless hope,
That in dark hours when we despairing grope
In ever clearer accents shall be heard:
No tyrant's perfidy may kill God's word.
Still trembling, in the valley, in the gloom,
About us frowning rocks strange shapes assume;
But unto faith that fears nor wreck nor storm
There dawns a golden day that shall transform
These spectres of a long and cruel night
To ministering friends in new-born light,
When tried by travail and by fire and rod
We shall emerge, unchanged, to face our God.
MARKED in the midst of the glittering throng
A figure all bent and retreating;
His raiment was shabby, and bearded his face,
His gaze was bewildering and fleeting;
And those whose drossiness glared through the gilt
Guffawed a contemptuous greeting.
Intently I peered in his time lined face
And read there his marvellous story;
His brows were large with the wisdom of pain,
His locks by affliction made hoary;
A memory lurked in the depth of his eyes,
A prayer and a vision of glory.
A mem'ry aglow with the splendors of old,
A prayer of patience and yearning,
And a vision of Home that gleamed in the dark,
Through ages of weary sojourning;
Yet they of the gilded and glittering throng
Had naught but derision and spurning.
He folded a dream to his quivering heart
And nursed it through vigils of ages;
He gave it the blood of his life to absorb
Yet mockery now is his wages..
Shall this be the word his story to close,
A jeer be the last of its pages?
BEARDED old patriarchs, flippant young men,
Faces from synagogue, tenement, den,
Native and foreign and Gentile and Jew-
Faces of every contour and hue—
Bad faces, good faces, carved-out-of-wood faces,
Scarred faces, marred faces, tender and hard faces.
Clusters and bevies of trim little Jewesses,
Telling what "Abie" or "Ikey" or "Louie" says,
Beauties from Italy, Russia and France,
Clad in their gayest of clothes for a dance;
Hawksters and womenfolk bargaining, bickering,
Polyglot, clamoring, bartering, dickering
Under the lights that are flaring and flickering;
Lovers and criminals, preachers and panderers,
Lawyers and pawnbrokers, flashy philanderers.
Every conceivable garb for the viewing-
Rags that are fluttering, silks all frou-frouing;
Here shivers misery, near by we have a new
Modiste's creation as "swell as the Avenue";
Hats up to date and of hoariest lineage!
Simpering girls at the utterly ninny age,
Babies in arms and young boys at the skinny age
Mix in with fat men and beggars a-muttering,
Where from the pushcarts the peddlers are sputtering
Praises unending for wares they are vending;
Furniture, notions and kitchen utensils,
Suits, furs and underwear, pictures and pencils:
Stores all ablaze 'mid a babble that's furious-
Rich people, poor people, quaint folks and curious,
Painted dames, queens of a doubtful society,
Folks and more folks in an endless variety,
Scions of different nations and races
Coming and going from thousands of places!
Color and movement and bustle and noise,
Mothers and fathers and maidens and boys,
Glad folks and sorrowful, dreary or cheery,
Beautiful, horrible, lively or weary,
Loving and hateful and sober and bleary,
Glitter and grayness and laughter and pain,
Passing, repassing and passing again.
Life! that is all, with its mirth and its toiling,
Life-like a kettle that's bubbling and boiling,
Under the glare of the merciless light-
Heart of the Ghetto on Saturday night!
YE may not rear it now, though some aver
The eye of man shall see it where it stood,— The glittering House of God, with cedar-wood Well builded, and with olive and with fir,
Cunningly carved with wide-winged cherubim, And flowers full-blown, and palm-trees fair and slim. The ancient, unforgetting Eastern sky—
Blue as the sapphire in the breast-plate set,
That, watching waits, may not behold it yet;
Though there be breasts where longing will not
die;
Though still Jerusalem's holy earth be shed,
Dear symbol, o'er the unalienated dead!
Yet unto you, O sons of Israel!
This year, this day, this hour, and in this land, 'Tis given to lend with joy the helping hand. To rear a mighty Temple builded well,
Its blocks young souls, unhewn yet by the keen
Steel of the desecrating world, and clean.
Bring, bring, bright gold, and melt it in the fire.
So shall that faithful offering overspread
A spiritual altar, be ye sure;
So to the strength of Israel shall aspire
From lamps of many branches flamelets pure,
The light of lives with oil of knowledge fed!
HELEN GRAY CONE.
|