O people's king and shepherd, throned Law,
Strike down the monsters of Monopoly.
Lift up thy club, O mighty Hercules!
Behold thy "Labors" yet unfinished are:
Tear off thy Nessus shirt and bare thine arms.
The Numean lion fattens on our flocks;
The Lernean Hydra coils around our farms,
Our towns, our mills, our mines, our factories;
The triple monster Geryon lives again,
Grown quadruple, and over all our plains
And thousand hills his fattening oxen feed.
Stymphalean buzzards ravage round our fields;
The Augean stables reeking stench the land;
The hundred-headed monster Cerberus,
That throttled Greece and ravaged hapless France,
Hath broke from hell and howls for human blood.
Lift up thy knotted club, O Hercules!
Strike swift and sure: crush down the Hydra's heads;
Throttle the Numean lion: strike! nor spare
The monster Geryon or the buzzard-beaks.
Clean the Augean stables if thou can'st;
But hurl the hundred-headed monster down
Headlong to Hades: chain him; make thee sure
He shall not burst the bonds of hell again.
To you, O chosen makers of the laws,
The nation looks--and shall it look in vain?
Will ye sit idle, or in idle wind
Blow out your zeal, and crack your party whips,
Or drivel dotage, while the crisis cries--
While all around the dark horizon loom
Clouds thunder-capped that bode a hurricane?
Sleep ye as slept the "Notables" of France,
While under them an hundred AEtnas hissed
And spluttered sulphur, gathering for the shock?
Be ye our Hercules--and Lynceus-eyed:
Still ye the storm or ere the storm begin--
Ere "Liberty" take Justice by the throat,
And run moon-mad a Malay murder-muck,
Throttle the "Trusts", and crush the coils combined
That crack our bones and fatten on our fields.
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