Chapter IV

OVER THE SAMOVAR. {69a} (_Foo-chow_.)

"Yes, I used always to think
That you Russians knew
How to make the good drink
As none others do.

"And I thought moreover,
(Not with the epicures),
You might search the world over
For such women as yours.

"In both these matters now
I perceive I was right,
And I really can't tell you how
Much I delight

"In my third (Thanks, another cup!)
Idea of the fun,
When your country gets up
And follows the sun!

"And just as in Europe, see,
There's a conqueror nation,
So why not in Asia be
A like jubilation?

"Taught as well as organized, {69b}
The eternal Coolie,
From being robbed and despised,
Takes to cutting throats duly!

"But--please, don't be flurried;
For I daresay by then
You'll be comfortably buried,
Ladies and gentlemen!

"No more, thanks! I must be going!
I'm so glad to have made this
Opportunity of knowing
Some more Russian ladies!"

TO JAPAN.

Simple you were, and good. No kindlier heart
Beat than the heart within your gentle breast.
Labour you had, and happiness, and rest,
And were the maid of nations. Now you start
To feverish life, feeling the poisonous smart
Upon your lips of harlot lips close-pressed,
The lips of her who stands among the rest
With greasy righteous soul and rotten heart.
O sunrise land, O land of gentleness,
What madness drives you to lust's dreadful bed?
O thrice accursed England, wretchedness
For ever be on you, of whom 'tis said,
Prostitute plague-struck, that you catch and kiss
Innocent lives to make them foully dead!

DAI BUTSU. {70} (_Kama Kura_.)

He sits. Upon the kingly head doth rest
The round-balled wimple, and the heavy rings
Touch on the shoulders where the shadow clings.
The downward garment shows the ambiguous breast;
The face--that face one scarce can look on lest
One learn the secret of unspeakable things;
But the dread gaze descends with shudderings,
To the veiled couched knees, the hands and thumbs close-pressed.
O lidded, downcast eyes that bear the weight
Of all our woes and terrible wrong's increase:
Proud nostrils, lips proud-perfecter than these,
With what a soul within you do you wait!
Disdain and pity, love late-born of hate,
Passion eternal, patience, pain and peace!

"ENGLAND."

Where'er I go in this dense East,
In sunshine or shade,
I retch at the villainous feast
That England has made.

And my shame cannot understand,
As scorn springs elate,
How I ever loved that land
That now I hate!

THE FISHERMAN. (_Mindanao_, _Philippines_.)

In the dark waveless sea,
Deep blue under deep blue,
The fisher drifts by on the tide
In his small pole-balanced canoe.

Above him the cloud-clapped hills
Crown the dense jungly sweeps;
The cocoa-nut groves hedge round
The hut where the beach-wave sleeps.

Is it not better so
To be as this savage is,
Than to live the wage-slave's life
Of hopeless agonies?

A SOUTH-SEA ISLANDER.

Aloll in the warm clear water,
On her back with languorous limbs,
She lies. The baby upon her breasts
Paddles and falls and swims.

With half-closed eyes she smiles,
Guarding it with her hands;
And the sob swells up in my heart--
In my heart that understands.

_Dear_, _in the English country_,
_The hatefullest land on earth_,
_The mothers are starved and the children die_,
_And death is better than birth_!

NEW GUINEA "CONVERTS."

I saw them as they were born,
Erect and fearless and free,
Facing the sun and the wind
Of the hills and the sea.

I saw them naked, superb,
Like the Greeks long ago,
With shield and spear and arrow
Ready to strike and throw.

I saw them as they were made
By the Christianizing crows,
Blinking, stupid, clumsy
In their greasy ill-cut clothes:

I heard their gibbering cant,
And they sung those hymns that smell
Of poor souls besotted, degraded
With the fear of "God" and "hell."

And I thought if Jesus could see them,
He who loved the freedom, the light,
And loathed those who compassed heaven
And earth for one proselyte,

To make him, etcetera, etcetera,--
Then this sight, as on me or you,
Would act on him like an emetic,
And he'd have to go off and spue.

O Jesus, O man of the People,
Who died to abolish all this--
The pharisee rank and respectable,
The scribe and the greedy priest--

O Jesus, O sacred Socialist,
You would die again of shame,
If you were alive and could see
What things are done in your name.

A DEATH AT SEA. (_Coral Sea_, _Australia_.)

I.

Dead in the sheep-pen he lies,
Wrapped in an old brown sail.
The smiling blue sea and the skies
Know not sorrow nor wail.

Dragged up out of the hold,
Dead on his last way home,
Worn-out, wizened, a Chinee old,--
O he is safe--at home!

Brother, I stand not as these
Staring upon you here.
One of earth's patient toilers at peace
I see, I revere!

II.

In the warm cloudy night we go
From the motionless ship;
Our lanterns feebly glow;
Our oars drop and drip.

We land on the thin pale beach,
The coral isle's round us;
A glade of driven sand we reach;
Our burial ground's found us.

There we dig him a grave, jesting;
We know not his name.
What heeds he who is resting, resting?
Would I were the same!

Come away, it is over and done!
Peace and he shall not sever,
By moonlight nor light of the sun,
For ever and ever!

III. "DIRGE."

"Sleep in the pure driven sand,
(No one will know)
In the coral isle by the land
Where the blue tides come and go.

"Alive, thou wert poor, despised;
Dead, thou canst have
What mightiest monarchs have prized,
An eternal grave!

"Alone with the lovely isles,
With the lovely deep,
Where the sea-winds sing and the sunlight smiles
Thou liest asleep!"