Marion Strode
Went on till we arrived. And there was Ott
Serene and smiling in his prison clothes.
“We mean
To get a pardon for you,” Marion Strode
Spoke out at once, “and give this prison cell
To a certain orator of the commonplace.”
Ott laughed and said, “What for? You’d break his puerile
And shifty heart. This is a place for men
Who stand their ground. I may not have much brains,
But what I have I use as Socrates
Devoted his. I want to share the greatness
Of the great with what brains I possess. I like
This cell because it helps me do this.”
Then
We shook the hand of Ott and turned away!
THE GREAT RACE PASSES
They were the fair-haired Achæans,
Who won the Trojan war;
They were the Vikings who sailed to Iceland
And America.
They became the bone of England,
And the fire of Normandy,
And the will of Holland and Germany,
And the builders of America.
Their blood flowed into the veins of David,
And the veins of Jesus,
Homer and Æschylos,
Dante and Michael Angelo,
Alexander and Cæsar,
William of Orange and Washington.
They sang the songs,
They won the wars.
They were chosen for might in battle;
For blue eyes and white flesh,
For clean blood, for strength, for class.
They went to the wars
And left the little breeds
To stay with the women,
Trading and plowing.
They perished in battle
All the way along the stretch of centuries,
And left the little breeds to possess the earth—
The Great Race is passing.
They went forth to free peoples,
White and black.
They fought for their own freedom,
And perished.
They founded America,
And perished—
The Great Race is passing.