On the Jewish Exile

AY, send them out, the dark ones, into the desert,
If there is desert enough in all the world
To hold these lonely few, these trembling goats
Who take for burden all the sins of the flesh
Into the wilderness.

Blow bugles, Pomp.
Build armies, march with beautiful banners flying,
Young men and old with shouts and hands flung upwards,
Under the birds of death.

Make a place for graves:
A field for bones, a meadow for all (he people.
No need of flowers or grass or marble tombs;
For all will die, under the falling fire.
Who lives by the sword shall perish too by the sword.
Alas for Rome.

The days of her life are numbered.
Only the goats in the wilderness will survive this
Burning of cit ies, this war, this crying of children.
Only the kids in the desert will see the morning,
And slowly making their way back over the mountains
Feed again in peace In the shattered cities,
Browse again in the weeds of the ruined gardens.