The Maccabean

WHETHER of Fate, or by the hand of man,

His hallowed soul glows still the ages through;

Their flux the body changes, hue on hue,

But, brooding Ivanese or quick American,

His heart must answer to the Yaweh-clan

When thrills its call the earth or cracks the blue,

His spirit leaps onto the fray anew,

As when he shamed Olympus with his ban.

Not his is it to lag in the world-war

Nor to question whether he live or die,

And though his soul and sense red strife abhor,

His task forever is to purify.

Behold the standard that of old he bore

Flash like the sun into the clouded sky.