Life of Albert Parsons

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"Yet let me read to you a poem handed to me on the train as I came hither, written by I know not whom, but by some one whose breast was full of love, and whose brain could catch the inspiration of such a death as was theirs in whose memory we are here. Give me your hearts as I read:

"Under the cruel tree,
Planted by tyranny,
Grown in barbarity,
Fostered by wrong;
With stately, soldier pace,
With simple, manly grace,
Each hero took his place,
Steady and strong.

Wearing their robes of white,
As saints or martyrs might,
Calmly, in conscious right,
Faced they the world.
While on each face upturned
Sternly their sad eyes burned
Reproach, for blame unearned
Hatred had hurled.

Hatred, dull-eared and blind,
Hatred, of unsound mind,
Hatred, which gropes to find
That which is worst!
How could it judge a heart,
Where wrong and suffering start
The throbbing valves apart,
E'en till they burst?

How could it hear the can,
Through life's grim silence fall,
Sounding to waken all
Those souls who sleep?
How could it see the height?
That to those eyes was bright
Where, as a sun, in might,
Freedom shall sweep?