"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 hateful bed?
O thrice-accursèd 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.[1]
(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;
- ↑ This is one of the three well-known Japanese colossi of Gautama, the Buddha. The same type of proud patience marks this embodiment of the suffering East, wherever we meet it.
