My days are haunted by the thought
Of men in coils of Justice caught
With stone and steel, in chain and cell,
Of men condemned to living hell,-
Yet blame them not.
In my sun-joy their dark I see:
For what they are and had to be
Blame Nature, red in tooth and claw,
Blame laws beyond all human law,
-Blame Destiny.
Behind blind walls I see them go,
Grim spectres of eternal woe,
Drained grey of hope, dead souls of self-slain,-
And yet I know with pang of pain
It must be so.
I know that brother's blood they've spilt,
And sons of Cain must pay their guilt;
I know the deviltries that stem
From dark abyss we must condemn;
I know that but for heaven's grace
We might be rotting in their place:
-God pity them!
The Damned
Robert Service
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Poem topics: brother, destiny, god, heaven, hope, joy, justice, nature, pain, red, sun, human, steel, place, eternal, chain, blind, thought, stone, dark, Print This Poem , Rhyme Scheme
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