What voice was this that coursed like liquid fire
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raised my burning eyes, beheld a fieldAll multitudinous with carnal yield,A grim ensanguined mead whereon I sawEvolve the ancient fundamental lawOf tooth and talon, fist and nail and claw.There with the force of living, hostile hillsWhose clash the hemmed-in vale with clamor fills,With greater din contended fierce majestic willsOf beast with beast, of man with man, in strifeFor love of what my heart despised, for lifeThat unto me at dawn was now a prayerFor night, at night a bloody heart-wrung tearFor day again; for _this_, these groansFrom tangled flesh and interlockèd bones.And no thing died that did not giveA testimony that it longed to live.Man, strange composite blend of brute and god,Pushed on, nor backward glanced where last he trod.He seemed to mount a misty ladder flungPendant from a cloud, yet never gained a rungBut at his feet another tugged and clung.My heart was still a pool of bitterness,Would yield nought else, nought else confess.I spoke (although no form was thereTo see, I knew an ear was there to hear),“Well, let them fight; they _can_ whose flesh is fair.”
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