For Those Who Are As Right As Any

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"Spirit, they charge you that the time is ill.
The great wall sinks in the slime!"
"I am a spirit, still.
I do not 'walk 'with the time"

"The sky shivers, the king is a beast run wild,
The lords are sullen and base!"
"When the sun rose up in the East like a great child,
I saw the gold and the face"

"Come, draw your steel for the right, for the time wears on!
It is only a little way to Jerusalem!'
"I have seen the floating swan
And the lion, bloody with dawn,
I will make pictures of them."

"What, lift no sword in the battle?
"I am swordless."
"No cause, no cry?"
"I am lordless."
"I am shadow, shadow that passes across the meadow
And goes its way
"
"By God, against God, in our name, we will slay you, then!"
"Slay."

"And, when we have slain them all, we will build for men
The city called Marvelous, the glittering town,
And none shall be exalted or cast down
But all at ease, all hatreds reconciled."

"I am air and I live. I live again and again.
I am wind and fire. But I am not reconciled"

© Stephen Vincent Benet