After the German Subjugation of France, 1871
LO the twelfth year—the wedding—feast come round
With years for months—and lo the babe new—born;
Out of the womb’s rank furnace cast forlorn,
And with contagious effluence seamed and crown’d.
To hail this birth, what fiery tongues surround
Hell’s Pentecost—what clamour of all cries
That swell, from Absalom’s scoff to Shimei’s,
One scornful gamut of tumultuous sound!
For now the harlot’s heart on a new sleeve
Is prankt; and her heart’s lord of yesterday
(Spurned from her bed, whose worm—spun silks o’erlay
Such fretwork as that other worm can weave)
Takes in his ears the vanished world’s last yell,
And in his flesh the closing teeth of Hell.
