Frank Little at Calvary I

He walked under the shadow of the HillWhere men are fed into the firesAnd walled apart...Unarmed and alone,He summoned his mates from the pit's mouthWhere tools rested on the floorsAnd great cranes swungUnemptied, on the iron girders.And they, who were the Lords of the Hill,Were seized with a great fear,When they heard out of the silence of wheelsThe answer ringingIn endless reverberationsUnder the mountain...

So they covered up their facesAnd crept upon him as he slept...Out of eye-holes in black clothThey looked upon him who had flungBetween them and their ancient preyThe frail barricade of his life...And when night--that has connived at so much--Was heavy with the unborn day,They haled him from his bed...

Who might know of that wild ride?Only the bleak Hill--The red Hill, vigilant,Like a blood-shot eyeIn the black mask of night--Dared watch them as they racedBy each blind-folded streetGodiva might have ridden down...But when they stopped beside the Place,I know he turned his faceWistfully to the accessory night...

And when he saw--against the sky,Sagged like a silken netUnder its load of stars--The black bridge poisedLike a gigantic spider motionless...I know there was a silence in his heart,As of a frozen sea,Where some half lifted arm, mid-wayWavers, and drops heavily...

I know he waved to life,And that life signaled back, transcending space,To each high-powered sense,So that he missed no gesture of the windDrawing the shut leaves close...So that he saw the light on comrades' facesOf camp fires out of sight...And the savor of meat and breadBlew in his nostrils... and the breathOf unrailed spacesWhere shut wild clover smelled as sweetAs a virgin in her bed.

I know he looked once at America,Quiescent, with her great flanks on the globe,And once at the skies whirling above him...Then all that he had spoken againstAnd struck against and thrust againstOver the frail barricade of his lifeRushed between him and the stars...