Poetry.
The Pirate to the Captive Slave
Is the wild, wild thoughts are in your heart, And the wild blood in each vein, 0, you'll find the way to a wilder deed, And you'll do it, o'er and again : But beyond the deed, and beyond the blood, And beyond the thought of the heart, There's a soul you yet may find by love, A soul you yet may bind by love, A soul that still is kind, if love But teach it her gentle art.
0, you've never felt when the night is dark And sultry skies hang low And the raindrops hiss on the burning deck, Wicked and hot and slow,
And you strain your eyes that can scarcely see— And the naked sword in your hand— That the hour the Fates thus send to you Is the hour when Fortune may bend to you, Or that, or the world may end for you—
But the joy few understand.
If another fall in the dim midnight, When swords flash breast to breast, He dies, while the world is free and young And, strong, sinks into rest : And all is Fortune, and all is fair, And he or I may fall :
We but forestall the hour of death, We mock the paltry power of death, *We pluck the purple flower of death, And the fight's' fierce joy is all I
K. M. CARROLL
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