Secret History of the English Occupation of Egypt

"We have had enough of strangers and of princes
Nursed on our knees and lords within our house.
The bread which they have eaten was our children's,
For them the feasting and the shame for us.

"The shadow of their palaces, fair dwellings
Built with our blood and kneaded with our tears,
Darkens the land with darkness of Gehennem,
The lust, the crime, the infamy of years.

"Did ye not hear it? From those muffled windows
A sound of women rises and of mirth.
These are our daughters – ay our sons – in prison,
Captives to shame with those who rule the Earth.

"The silent river by those gardens lapping
To-night receives its burden of new dead,
A man of age sent home with his lord's wages,
Stones to his feet, a grave-cloth to his head.

"Walls infamous in beauty, gardens fragrant
With rose and citron and the scent of blood.
God shall blot out the memory of all laughter,
Rather than leave you standing where you stood.

"We have had enough of princes and of strangers,
Slaves that were Sultans, eunuchs that were kings,
The shame of Sodom is on all their faces.
The curse of Cain pursues them, and it clings.

"Is there no virtue? See the pale Greek smiling.
Virtue for him is as a tale of old.
Which be his gods? The cent. per cent. in silver.
His God of gods? The world's creator, Gold.

"The Turk that plunders and the Frank that panders,
These are our lords who ply with lust and fraud.
The brothel and the winepress and the dancers
Are gifts unneeded in the lands of God.

"We need them not. We heed them not. Our faces
Are turned to a new Kebla, a new truth,
Proclaimed by the one God of all the nations
To save His people and renew their youth.

"A truth which is of knowledge and of reason;
Which teaches men to mourn no more and live;
Which tells them of things good as well as evil,
And gives what Liberty alone can give,

"The counsel to be strong, the will to conquer,
The love of all things just and kind and wise,
Freedom for slaves, fair rights for all as brothers,
The triumph of things true, the scorn of lies.

"Oh men, who are my brethren, my soul's kindred!
That which our fathers dreamed of as a dream,
The sun of peace and justice, has arisen
And God shall work in you His perfect scheme.

"The rulers of your Earth shall cease deceiving,
The men of usury shall fly your land.
Your princes shall be numbered with your servants,
And peace shall guide the sword in your right hand.

"You shall become a nation with the nations.
Lift up your voices, for the night is past.
Stretch forth your hands. The hands of the free peoples
Have beckoned you – the youngest and the last.

"And in the brotherhood of Man reposing,
Joined to their hopes and nursed in their new day,
The anguish of the years shall be forgotten
And God, with these, shall wipe your tears away."

IV

I have a thing to say. But how to say it?
How shall I tell the mystery of guile —
The fraud that fought – the treason that disbanded —
The gold that slew the children of the Nile?

The ways of violence are hard to reckon,
And men of right grow feeble in their will,
And Virtue of her sons has been forsaken,
And men of peace have turned aside to kill.

How shall I speak of them, the priests of Baal,
The men who sowed the wind for their ill ends?
The reapers of the whirlwind in that harvest
Were all my countrymen, were some my friends.

Friends, countrymen and lovers of fair freedom —
Souls to whom still my soul laments and cries.
I would not tell the shame of your false dealings,
Save for the blood which clamours to the skies.

A curse on Statecraft, not on you my Country!
The men you slew were not more foully slain
Than was your honour at their hands you trusted.