If the tree grows till bark and iron touch
And then stops growing, ring and tree are matched
And the fulfillment fits. But, if by some
Unlikely chance, the growing still keeps on,
The tree must burst the binding-ring or die.
I have not once controlled the circumstances.
They have controlled me. But with that control
They made me grow or die. And I have grown.
The iron ring is burst. Three elements,
Earth, water and fire. I have passed through them all,
Still to find no Elysium for my hands,
Still to find no Elysium but growth,
And the slow will to grow to match my task.
Three elements. I have not sought the fourth
Deeply, till now—the element of air,
The everlasting element of God,
Who must be there in spite of all we see,
Who must be there in spite of all we bear,
Who must exist where all Elysiums
Are less than shadows of a hunter’s fire
Lighted at night to scare a wolf away.
I know that wolf—his scars are in my hide
And no Elysiums can rub them out.
Therefore at last, I lift my hands to You
Who Were and Are and Must Be, if our world
Is anything but a lost ironclad
Shipped with a crew of fools and mutineers
To drift between the cold forts of the stars.
I’ve never found a church that I could join
Although I’ve prayed in churches in my time
And listened to all sorts of ministers
Well, they were good men, most of them, and yet—
The thing behind the words—it’s hard to find.
I used to think it wasn’t there at all
Couldn’t be there. I cannot say that, now.
And now I pray to You and You alone.
Teach me to know Your will. Teach me to read
Your difficult purpose here, which must be plain
If I had eyes to see it. Make me just.
There was a man I knew near Pigeon Creek
Who kept a kennel full of hunting dogs,
Young dogs and old, smart hounds and silly hounds.
He’d sell the young ones every now and then,
Smart as they were and slick as they could run.
But the one dog he’d never sell or lend
Was an old half-deaf foolish-looking hound
You wouldn’t think had sense to scratch a flea
Unless the flea were old and sickly too.
Most days he used to lie beside the stove
Or sleeping in a piece of sun outside.
Folks used to plague the man about that dog
And he’d agree to everything they said,
“No—he ain’t much on looks—or much on speed—
A young dog can outrun him any time,
Outlook him and outeat him and outleap him,
But, Mister, that dog’s hell on a cold scent
And, once he gets his teeth in what he’s after,
He don’t let go until he knows he’s dead.”
I am that old, deaf hunting-dog, O Lord,
And the world’s kennel holds ten thousand hounds
Smarter and faster and with finer coats
To hunt your hidden purpose up the wind
And bell upon the trace you leave behind.
But, when even they fail and lose the scent,
I will keep on because I must keep on
Until You utterly reveal Yourself
And sink my teeth in justice soon or late.
There is no more to ask of earth or fire
And water only runs between my hands,
But in the air, I’ll look, in the blue air,
The old dog, muzzle down to the cold scent,
Day after day, until the tired years
Crackle beneath his feet like broken sticks
And the last barren bush consumes with peace.
I should have tried the course with younger legs,
This hunting-ground is stiff enough to pull
The metal heart out of a dog of steel;
I should have started back at Pigeon Creek
From scratch, not forty years behind the mark.
But you can’t change yourself, and, if you could,
You might fetch the wrong jack-knife in the swap.
It’s up to you to whittle what you can
With what you’ve got—and what I am, I am
For what it’s worth, hypo and legs and all.
I can’t complain. I’m ready to admit
You could have made a better-looking dog
From the same raw material, no doubt,
But, since You didn’t, this’ll have to do.
Therefore I utterly lift up my hands
To You, and here and now beseech Your aid.
I have held back when others tugged me on,
I have gone on when others pulled me back
Striving to read Your will, striving to find
The justice and expedience of this case,
Hunting an arrow down the chilly airs
Until my eyes are blind with the great wind
And my heart sick with running after peace.
And now, I stand and tremble on the last
Edge of the last blue cliff, a hound beat out,
Tail down and belly flattened to the ground,
My lungs are breathless and my legs are whipped,
Everything in me’s whipped except my will.
I can’t go on. And yet, I must go on.
I will say this. Two months ago I read
My proclamation setting these men free
To Seward and the rest. I told them then
I was not calling on them for advice
But to hear something that I meant to do.
We talked about it. Most of them approved
The thing, if not the time. Then Seward said
Something I hadn’t thought of, “I approve
The proclamation—but, if issued now
With our defeats in everybody’s mouth
It may be viewed as a last shriek for help
From an exhausted, beaten government.
Put it aside until a victory comes,
Then issue it with victory.” He was right,
I put the thing aside—and ever since
There has been nothing for us but defeat,
Up to this battle now—and still no news.
If I had eyes to look to Maryland!
If I could move that battle with my hands!
No, it don’t work. I’m not a general.
All I can do is trust the men who are.
I’m not a general, but I promise this,
Here at the end of every ounce of strength
That I can muster, here in the dark pit
Of ignorance that is not quite despair
And doubt that does but must not break the mind!
The pit I have inhabited so long
At various times and seasons, that my soul
Has taken color in its very grains
From the blind darkness, from the lonely cave
That never hears a footstep but my own
Nor ever will, while I’m a man alive
To keep my prison locked from visitors.
What if I heard another footstep there,
What if, some day—there is no one but God,
No
