In the heart of the world is the call for love:
White heart—Red—Yellow—and Black.
Each face turns to Bethlehem’s bright star above,
Though wolves of self howl at each back.
The whole earth is lifting its voice in a prayer
That nations may learn to endure,
Without killing and maiming, but doing what’s fair
With a soul that is noble and pure.
Love in weak peoples; love in the strong;
Love that will banish all hatred and wrong.
In the heart of the world is the call of God;
East—West—and North—and South.
Stirring, deep-yearning, breast-heaving call for God
A-tremble behind each mouth.
The heart’s ill of torments that rend men’s souls.
Skyward lift all faiths and hopes;
Across all the oceans the evidence rolls,
Refreshing all life’s arid slopes.
God in the highborn; God in the low;
God calls us, world-brothers. Hark ye! and know.
From Poems of the Four Seas I will take a piece that gives the Negro background for the yearning expressed in the foregoing poem:
BROTHERS
They bind his feet; they thong his hands
With hard hemp rope and iron bands.
They scourge his back in ghoulish glee;
And bleed his flesh;—men, mark ye—free.
