How perilous life will become on earthWhen the great breed of man has covered all.The world, that was too large, will be too small.Deserts and mountains will have been explored,Valleys swarmed through; and our prolific breed,Exceeding death ten million times by birth,Will halt (bewildered, bored),And then may droop and dwindle like an autumn weed.
How shall we meet that moment when we knowThere is no room to grow;We, conscious, and with lonely startled eyesGlaring upon ourselves, and with no LordTo pray to: judged, without appeal,What shall we feel?He, being withdrawn, no supplicating criesWill call Him back. He'll speak no farther word.
Can special vision be required to seeWhat few pale centuries will take us there,Where, at the barrier of the future, weShall stand condemned, in serried ranks, and stareAt Nothing.-fearing Something may appear?
The Earth is covered with large auction boards,And all her lands are reckoned up for sale.The spaces that are now called virgin soilWill soon be bought, and covered with great breedOf human seed;And, when the driven hordesCry ."Food!.".-but find no more for any toil,Fear, fear will strike all eyes and faces pale.Then no one more will speak,But, rising from a murmur to a wail,One voice, for all, will, like a Siren, shriek.
Is there no pledge to make at once with EarthWhile yet we have not murdered all her trees;Before it is too late for oath or pledge;While yet man may be happy in his birth.-Before we have to fall upon our knees,Clinging for safety to her farthest edge?
It is not very noble that we killHer lions and tigers, all. Is that our reign?.-Then let us build ourselves on earth again.What is the human will?
Is it so clearly better than the ant's?And is our life more holy than the plants'?They do fulfil their purpose every year,And bring no pain, nor fear.
Woe to that miserable last mankind;And, when I think of that, I have a dreadI may awake on earth, again, to findMyself, among it, living oh, not dead.
I had been thinking of that final Earth.Then I remembered she herself would lickHer own lithe body clean, and from her girthWipe any vermin that might cling too thick.
Damned! Damned! Apparent conqueror to-day.-Oh, evanescent sway!O drunken lust!O swarming dust!
Man makes himself believe he has claimTo plant bright flags on every hill he swarms;But in the end, and in his own wild name,And for the better prospect of his fame,Whether it be a person or a race,Earth, with a smiling face,Will hold and smother him in her large arms.
