Poetry: A Magazine of Verse
"Seigneur!—le créateur du ciel et de la terre!—
Forgotten me, forgotten me!"
And then the voice grew weak,
The brother leaned to ease the huddled body. But a shriek
Repulsed him: "Non! Détache-moi! I don't care
For you. Non! Tu es l'homme qui m'a trahi!
Non! Tu n'es pas mon frère!"
But as often as that mind would fill
With the great anguish and the rush of hate,
The boy, his young eyes older, older,
Would curve his shoulder
To the other's pain, and bind
Their hearts again, and say: "Oh, wait!
You'll know me better by and by.
Mon pauvre petit, be still—
Right here's your place."
The seeing gleam, the blinded stare,
The cry:
"Non, tu n'es pas mon frère!"
I saw myself, myself, as blind
As he. For something smothers
My reason. And I do not know my brothers . . .
But every day declare:
"Non, tu n'es pas mon frère!"
[6]
