ripped of the flesh that ye skulk within,
Stripped to the coward soul 'ware of its sin,
Ye shall learn, ye shall learn, whether dead men
hate!
Ah, a weary time has the waiting been,
But here in the shadows I wait, I wait!

A NIGHTMARE

LEAGUES before me, leagues behind,
Clamor warring wastes of flood,
All the streams of all the worlds
Flung together, mad of mood;
Through the canon beats a sound,
Regular of interval,
Distant, drumming, muffled, dull,
Thunderously rhythmical;

Crafts slip by my startled soul--
Soul that cowers, a thing apart--
They are corpuscles of blood!
That's the throbbing of a heart!
God of terrors!--am I mad?--
Through my body, mine own soul,
Shrunken to an atom's size,
Voyages toward an unguessed goal!

THE MOTHER

THE mother by the gallows-tree,
The gallows-tree, the gallows-tree,
(While the twitching body mocked the sun)
Lifted to Heaven her broken heart
And called for sympathy.

Then Mother Mary bent to her,
Bent from her place by God's left side,
And whispered: "Peace--do I not know?--
My son was crucified!"

"O Mother Mary," answered she,
"You cannot, cannot enter in
To my soul's woe--you cannot know--
For your son wrought no sin!"

(And men whose work compelled them there,
Their hearts were stricken dead;

They heard the rope creak on the beam;
I thought I heard the frightened ghost
Whimpering overhead.)

The mother by the gallows-tree,
The gallows-tree, the gallows-tree,
Lifted to Christ her broken heart
And called in agony.

Then Lord Christ bent to her and said:
"Be comforted, be comforted;
I know your grief; the whole world's woe
I bore upon my head."

"But O Lord Christ, you cannot know,
No one can know," she said, "no one"--
(While the quivering corpse swayed in the wind)--
"Lord Christ, no one can understand
Who never had a son!"

IN THE BAYOU

LAZY and slow, through the snags and trees
Move the sluggish currents, half asleep;
Around and between the cypress knees,
Like black, slow snakes the dark tides creep--
How deep is the bayou beneath the trees?
"Knee-deep,
Knee-deep,
Knee-deep,
Knee-deep!"
Croaks the big bullfrog of Reelfoot Lake
From his hiding-place in the draggled brake.

What is the secre