He said some extravagant things
And planted a few stings
Under the rich man’s hide.
And one of the sensational newspapers
Gave him a line or two for cutting capers
In front of the Palace of Justice and the Church.
But all the first-grade people took the other side
Of the street when they saw him coming
[...]
And this city had illustrious Pharisees,
And this city had a legion
Of men who make a business of religion—
With eyes one inch apart,
Dark and narrow of heart—
Who give themselves and give the city no peace,
And who are everywhere the best police
For Life as business.
And when they saw this youth
Was telling the truth,
And that his followers were multiplying,
And were going about rejoicing and defying
The social order, and were stirring up
The dregs of discontent in the cup
With the hand of their own happiness,
They saw dynamic mysteries
In the poems of lilies and trees:
Therefore they held him for a felony.
[...]
What he had in mind was simply Love.
But he was prosecuted
As a rebel, and as a rebel executed—
Right in a public place where all could see.
And his mother watched him hang for the felony.
He hated to die, being but thirty-three,
And fearing that his poems might be lost.
And certain members of the Bar Association,
And of the Civic Federation,
And of the League of Public Efficiency,
And a legion
Of men devoted to religion,
With policemen, soldiers, roughs,
Loose women, thieves and toughs,
Came out to see him die;
And hooted at him, giving up the ghost
In great despair and with a fearful cry!
-
Edgar Lee Masters, from "A Life in a Life" (1916)