358
PARTISAN REVIEW
Would warn all the godlike, the ogreish, the great,
That men who hate to live will live to hate,
Will live like maimed Samson, hugging his shame
For long years, but alert for the moment
That levelled himself and his lords under
One impending and humiliating thunder.
STRANGER-
Now that you have wrought your revolution,
Turned jungle into park, Jack into Jill,
Have tamed all the lions (except perhaps
A few left for tourists and for contrast),
Now that all are owners of this estate,
Suited and sated-do you not suspect
That this new skin is the integument
Of unamenable nature, I mean
That if yc,u strip this bright new world you'll get
The old black underwear of greed unchanged.
OLD MAN-
0 you are one of those mirror men who
Wave and weep goodbye to themselves leaving
On the train for To-morrow, who point back
To the iron track of instinct, the tied train
Of events, the irreversible wheels
Of history, and so relax on cushions
Of excuse, forgetting that action
Is in your hands, and time under your feet,
And rJle engine answers .for speed or stop.
The shadow on the future is your own
Unfocussed fear, thrown prodigally;
And your doubts are the private detectives
Employed by your dislike, to make a case
Against change or choice. Will you not be warned?
0 listen now. Doom strikes strictly as clocks.
Go home to your own land; it is late there, and
The fading day of safety involves you.
The rooks boil and bubble above the woods,
But will soon settle. Only the warplanes
Still stretch and strain the sky. Their auguries
