Intercession

I saw no more, but I woke, — and prayed:
'God! that made the Beast and the Woman!

God of the tigress! God of the human!
Look to these things whom Thou hast made!
Fierce and bloody and famine-stricken,
Knitted with iron vein and thew —
Strong and bloody, behold the two! —
We see them and sicken.

Mark! mark!

These outcasts fierce of the dark;
Where murmur the Wind and the Rain,
Where the Jungle darkens the plain,
And in street and lane.'

God answer'd clear, ' My will be done!
Woman-tigress and tigress- woman —
I made them both, the beast and the human,
But I struck a spark in the brain of the one.

And the spark is a fire, and the fire is a spirit;
Tho' ye may slay it, it cannot die —
Nay, it shall grow as the days go by,
For my Angels are near it —

Mark! mark!

Doth it not burn in the dark?
Spite of the curse and the stain,
Where the Jungle darkens the plain,
And in street and lane.'

God said, moreover: ' The spark shall grow —
'Tis blest, it gathers, its flame sha lighten,
Bless it and nurse it — let it brighten!
'Tis scatter'd abroad, 'tis a Seed I sow.
And the Seed is a Soul, and the Soul is the Human;
And it lighteth the face with a sign and a flame.

Not unto beasts have I given the same,
But to man and to woman.

Mark! mark!

The light shall scatter the dark:
Where murmur the Wind and the Rain,
Where the Jungle darkens the plain,
And in street and lane.'
... So faint, so dim, so sad to seeing,
Behold it burning! Only a spark!
So faint as yet, and so dim to mark,
In the tigress-eyes of the human being.
Fan it, feed it, in love and duty,
Track it, watch it in every place, —
Till it burns the bestial frame and face
To its own dim beauty.
Mark! mark!

A spark that grows in the dark;
A spark that burns in the brain;
Spite of the Wind and the Rain,
Spite of the Curse and the Stain;
Over the Sea and the Plain,
And in street and lane.