Poetry

A CHRISTMAS EVE IN CUBA.

Joaquin Miller


  • Their priests are many, for many their sins,
  • Their sins are many, for their land is fair;
  • The perfumed waves and the perfumed winds,
  • The cocoa-palms and the perfumed air;
  • The proud old Dons, so poor and so proud,
  • So poor their ghosts can scarce wear a shroud—
  • This town of Columbus has priests and prayer;
  • And great bells pealing in the palm land.

  • A proud Spanish Don lies shriven and dead;
  • The cross on his breast, a priest at his prayer;
  • His slave at his feet, his son at his head—
  • A slave's white face in her midnight hair;
  • A slave's white face, why, a face as white,
  • As white as that dead man's face this night—
  • This town of Columbus can pray for the dead;
  • Such great bells booming in the palm land.

  • The moon hangs dead up at heaven's white door;
  • As dead as the isle of the great, warm seas;
  • As dead as the Don, so proud and so poor,
  • With two quite close by the bed on their knees;
  • The slave at his feet, the son at his head,
  • And both in tears for the proud man dead—
  • This town of Columbus has tears, if you please;
  • And great bells pealing in the palm land.

  • Aye, both are in tears; for a child might trace
  • In the face of the slave, as the face of the son,
  • The same proud look of the dead man's face—
  • The beauty of one; and the valor of one
  • The slave at his feet, the son at his head,
  • This night of Christ, where the Don lies dead—
  • This town of Columbus, this land of the sun
  • Keeps great bells clanging in the palm land.

  • The slave is so fair, and so wonderful fair!
  • A statue stepped out from some temple of old;
  • Why, you could entwine your two hands in her hair,
  • Nor yet could encompass its ample, dark fold.
  • And oh, that pitiful, upturned face;
  • Her master lies dead—she knows her place.
  • This town of Columbus has hundreds at prayer,
  • And great bells booming in the palm land.

  • The proud Don dead, and this son his heir;
  • This slave his fortune. Now, what shall he do?
  • Why, what should he do? or what should he care,
  • Save only to cherish a pride as true?—
  • To hide his shame as the good priests hide
  • Black sins confessed when the damned have died.
  • This town of Columbus has pride with her prayer—
  • And great bells pealing in the palm land!

  • Lo, Christ's own hour in the argent seas,
  • And she, his sister, his own born slave!
  • His secret is safe; just master and she;
  • These two, and the dead at the door of the grave
  • And death, whatever our other friends do,
  • Why, death, my friend, is a friend most true—
  • This town of Columbus keeps pride and keeps prayer,
  • And great bells booming in the palm land.