The Ballad of Reading Gaol

V

               I know not whether Laws be right,                 Or whether Laws be wrong;               All that we know who lie in gaol                 Is that the wall is strong;               And that each day is like a year,                 A year whose days are long.               But this I know, that every Law                 That men have made for Man,               Since first Man took His brother's life,                 And the sad world began,               But straws the wheat and saves the chaff                 With a most evil fan.               This too I know- and wise it were                 If each could know the same-               That every prison that men build                 Is built with bricks of shame,               And bound with bars lest Christ should see                 How men their brothers maim.               With bars they blur the gracious moon,                 And blind the goodly sun:               And the do well to hide their Hell,                 For in it things are done               That Son of things nor son of Man                 Ever should look upon!               The vilest deeds like poison weeds                 Bloom well in prison-air:               It is only what is good in Man                 That wastes and withers there:               Pale Anguish keeps the heavy gate,                 And the warder is Despair.               For they starve the little frightened child                 Till it weeps both night and day:               And they scourge the weak, and flog the fool,                 And gibe the old and gray,               And some grow mad, and all grow bad,                 And none a word may say.               Each narrow cell in which we dwell                 Is a foul and dark latrine,               And the fetid breath of living Death                 Chokes up each grated screen,               And all, but Lust, is turned to dust                 In Humanity's machine.               The brackish water that we drink                 Creeps with a loathsome slime,               And the bitter bread they weigh in scales                 Is full of chalk and lime,               And Sleep will not lie down, but walks                 Wild-eyed, and cries to Time.               But though lean Hunger and green Thirst                 Like asp with adder fight,               We have little care of prison fare,                 For what chills and kills outright               Is that every stone one lifts by day                 Becomes one's heart by night.               With midnight always in one's heart,                 And twilight in one's cell,               We turn the crank, or tear the rope,                 Each in his separate Hell,               And the silence is more awful far                 Than the sound of a brazen bell.               And never a human voice comes near                 To speak a gentle word:               And the eye that watches through the door                 Is pitiless and hard:               And by all forgot, we rot and rot,                 With soul and body marred.               And thus we rust Life's iron chain                 Degraded and alone:               And some men curse, and some men weep,                 And some men make no moan:               But God's eternal Laws are kind                 And break the heart of stone.               And every human heart that breaks,                 In prison-cell or yard,               Is as that broken box that gave                 Its treasure to the Lord,               And filled the unclean leper's house                 With the scent of costliest nard.               Ah! happy they whose hearts can break                 And peace of pardon win!               How else may man make straight his plan                 And cleanse his soul from Sin?               How else but through a broken heart                 May Lord Christ enter in?               And he of the swollen purple throat,                 And the stark and staring eyes,               Waits for the holy hands that took                 The Thief to Paradise;               And a broken and a contrite heart                 The Lord will not despise.               The man in red who reads the Law                 Gave him three weeks of life,               Three little weeks in which to heal                 His soul of his soul's strife,               And cleanse from every blot of blood                 The hand that held the knife.               And with tears of blood he cleansed the hand,                 The hand that held the steel:               For only blood can wipe out blood,                 And only tears can heal:               And the crimson stain that was of Cain                 Became Christ's snow-white seal.

VI

               In Reading gaol by Reading town                 There is a pit of shame,               And in it lies a wretched man                 Eaten by teeth of flame,               In a burning winding-sheet he lies,                 And his grave has got no name.               And there, till Christ call forth the dead,                 In silence let him lie:               No need to waste the foolish tear,                 Or heave the windy sigh:               The man had killed the thing he loved,                 And so he had to die.               And all men kill the thing they love,                 By all let this be heard,               Some do it with a bitter look,                 Some with a flattering word,               The coward does it with a kiss,                 The brave man with a sword!THE END