And ring his heavy footfalls on the stone.
And if He came, what would we say to Him?
That prison is ourselves that we have built,
And, being so, its loneliness is just,
And, being so, its loneliness endures.
But, if another came, What would we say?
What can the blind say, given back their eyes?
No, it must be as it has always been.
We are all prisoners in that degree
And will remain so, but I think I know
This—God is not a jailor. … And I make
A promise now to You and to myself.
If this last battle is a victory
And they can drive the Rebel army back
From Maryland, back over the Potomac,
My proclamation shall go out at last
To set those other prisoners and slaves
From this next year, then and forever free.
So much for my will. Show me what is Yours!
That must be news, those footsteps in the hall,
Good news, or else they wouldn’t come so fast.
What is it, now? Yes, yes, I’m glad of that.
I’m very glad. There’s no mistake this time?
We have the best of them? They’re in retreat?
This is a great day, Stanton … … If McClellan
Can only follow up the victory now!
Lord, I will keep my promise and go on,
Your will, in much, still being dark to me,
But, in this one thing, as I see it, plain.
And yet—if Lee slips from our hands again
As he well may from all those last reports
And the war still goes on—and still no end—
Even after this Antietam—not for years—
I cannot read it but I will go on,
Old dog, old dog, but settled to the scent
And with fresh breath now from this breathing space,
Almighty God. At best we never seem
To know You wholly, but there’s something left,
A strange, last courage. We can fail and fail,
But, deep against the failure, something wars,
Something goes forward, something lights a match,
Something gets up from Sangamon County ground
Armed with a bitten and a blunted axe
And after twenty thousand wasted strokes
Brings the tall hemlock crashing to the ground.
Spade saw the yellow river rolling ahead
His sore, cracked lips curled back in a death’s head grin
And his empty belly ceased to stick to his sides.
He sat on the bank a minute to rest his legs
And catch his breath. He had lived for the last three days
On a yam, two ears of horse-corn and the lame rabbit
That couldn’t run away when he threw the stick.
He was still a big man but the ribs stuck into his skin
And the hard, dry muscles were wasted to leather thongs.
“Boy, I wisht we had a good meal,” he thought with a dull
Fatigue. “Dat’s Freedom’s lan’ ovah dere fer sho’,
But how we gwine to swim it without a good meal?
I wisht we had even a spoonful of good hot pot-licker
Or a smidgin’ of barbecued shote. Dat river’s cold.
Colder’n Jordan. I wisht we had a good meal.”
He went down to the river and tested it with his hand.
The cold jumped up his arm and into his heart,
Sharp as the toothache. His mouth wried up in a queer
Grimace. He felt like crying. “I’se tired,” he said.
“Flow easy, river,” he said. Then he tumbled in.
The hard shock of the plunge took his breath away.
So stinging at first that his arms and legs moved fast,
But then the cold crept into his creaking bones
And he rolled wild eyes. “Oh, God,” he thought as he struggled,
“I’se weak as a cat. I ust to be a strong man.”
The yellow flood sucked round him, pulling him down,
The yellow foam had a taste like death in his mouth,
“We ought to of had a good meal,” he thought with a weak
Wonder, as he fought weakly. “A good hot meal.
Dis current, she’s too strong for a hungry mouth.
We’se done our best, but she fights like a angel would
Like wrestlin’ with a death-angel.” He choked and sank
To come up gasping and staring with bloodshot eyes.
His brain had a last, clear flash. “You’re drowned,” said the brain.
Then it stopped working. But the black, thrashing hands
Caught hold of something solid and hard and rough
And hung to it with a last exhausted grip.
—He had been fighting an angel for seven nights
And now he hung by his hands to the angel’s neck,
Lost in an iron darkness of beating wings,
If he once let go, the angel would push him off
And touch him across the loins with a stony hand
In the last death-trick of the wrestle. He moaned a little.
The blackness began to lighten. He saw the river
Rolling and rolling. He was clutched to a log
Like a treetoad set afloat on a chip of wood,
And the log and he were rushing downstream together,
But the current pulled them both toward the freedom side.
He hunched up a little higher. An eddy took
The log and him and spun them both like a top
While he prayed and sickened. Then they were out of the eddy
And drifting along more slowly, straight for the shore.
He hauled himself up the bank with enormous care,
Vomited and lay down. When he could arise
He looked at his hands. They were still hooked into a curve.
It took quite a time to straighten them back again.
He said a prayer as he tried to dry his clothes,
Then he looked for a stone and threw it into the river.
“You’se a mean and hungry river,” he said. “You is.
Heah’s a present for you. I hope it busts up your teef.
Heah’s a present fum Mistah Spade.” He felt better then,
But his belly started to ache. “Act patient,” he said,
Rubbing it gently, “We’se loose in Freedom’s land,
Crossed old Jordan—bound to get vittles now.”
He started out for the town. The town wasn’t far
But he had to go slow. Sometimes he fell on the way.
The last time he fell was in front of a little yard
With a white, well-painted fence. A woman came out.
“Get along,” she said. “You can’t get sick around here.
I’m tired of you nigger tramps. You’re all of you thieves.”
Spade rose and said something vague about swimming rivers
And vittles. She stamped her foot. “Get along!” she said,
“Get along or I’ll call the dog and—” Spade got along.
The next house, the dog was
