The Ballad of the Reading Gaol - Oscar Wilde

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	Oscar Wilde

The Ballad of the Reading Gaol



	I

	He did not wear his scarlet coat,
	For blood and wine are red,
	And blood and wine were on his hands
	When they found him with the dead,
5	The poor dead woman whom he loved,
	And murdered in her bed.

	He walked amongst the Trial Men
	In a suit of shabby grey;
	A cricket cap was on his head,
10	And his step seemed light and gay;
	But I never saw a man who looked
	So wistfully at the day.

	I never saw a man who looked
	With such a wistful eye
15	Upon that little tent of blue
	Which prisoners call the sky,
	And at every drifting cloud that went
	With sails of silver by.

	I walked, with other souls in pain,
20	Within another ring,
	And was wondering if the man had done
	A great or little thing,
	When a voice behind me whispered low,
	„That fellow's got to swing.“

25	Dear Christ! the very prison walls
	Suddenly seemed to reel,
	And the sky above my head became
	Like a casque of scorching steel;
	And, though I was a soul in pain,
30	My pain I could not feel.

	I only knew what hunted thought
	Quickened his step, and why
	He looked upon the garish day
	With such a wistful eye;
35	The man had killed the thing he loved,
	And so he had to die.

	Yet each man kills the thing he loves,
	By each let this be heard,
	Some do it with a bitter look,
40	Some with a flattering word,
	The coward does it with a kiss,
	The brave man with a sword!

	Some kill their love when they are young,
	And some when they are old;
45	Some strangle with the hands of Lust,
	Some with the hands of Gold:
	The kindest use a knife because
	The dead so soon grow cold.

	Some love too little, some too long,
50	Some sell, and others buy;
	Some do the deed with many tears,
	And some without a sigh:
	For each man kills the thing he loves,
	Yet each man does not die.

55	He does not die a death of shame
	On a day of dark disgrace,
	Nor have a noose about his neck,
	Nor a cloth upon his face,
	Nor drop feet foremost through the floor
60	Into an empty space.

	He does not sit with silent men
	Who watch him night and day;
	Who watch him when he tries to weep,
	And when he tries to pray;
65	Who watch him lest himself should rob
	The prison of its prey.

	He does not wake at dawn to see
	Dread figures throng his room,
	The shivering Chaplain robed in white,
70	The Sheriff stern with gloom,
	And the Governor all in shiny black,
	With the yellow face of Doom.

	He does not rise in piteous haste
	To put on convict-clothes,
75	While some coarse-mouthed Doctor gloats, and notes
	Each new and nerve-twitched pose,
	Fingering a watch whose little ticks
	Are like horrible hammer-blows.

	He does not know that sickening thirst
80	That sands one's throat, before
	The hangman with his gardener's gloves
	Slips through the padded door,
	And binds one with three leathern thongs,
	That the throat may thirst no more.

85	He does not bend his head to hear
	The Burial Office read,
	Nor, while the terror of his soul
	Tells him he is not dead,
	Cross his own coffin, as he moves
90	Into the hideous shed.

	He does not stare upon the air
	Through a little roof of glass:
	He does not pray with lips of clay
	For his agony to pass;
95	Nor feel upon his shuddering cheek
	The kiss of Caiaphas.

	II

	Six weeks our guardsman walked the yard,
	In the suit of shabby grey :
	His cricket cap was on his head,
100	And his step seemed light and gay,
	But I never saw a man who looked
	So wistfully at the day.

	I never saw a man who looked
	With such a wistful eye
105	Upon that little tent of blue
	Which prisoners call the sky,
	And at every wandering cloud that trailed
	Its ravelled fleeces by,

	He did not wring his hands, as do
110	Those witless men who dare
	To try to rear the changeling Hope
	In the cave of black Despair:
	He only looked upon the sun,
	And drank the morning air

115	He did not wring his hands nor weep,
	Nor did he peek or pine,
	But he drank the air as though it held
	Some healthful anodyne;
	With open mouth he drank the sun
120	As though it had been wine!

	And I and all the souls in pain,
	Who tramped the other ring,
	Forgot if we ourselves had done
	A great or little thing,
125	And watched with gaze of dull amaze
	The man who had to swing.

	And strange it was to see him pass
	With a step so light and gay,
	And strange it was to see him look
130	So wistfully at the day,
	And strange it was to think that he
	Had such a debt to pay.

	For oak and elm have pleasant leaves
	That in the spring-time shoot:
135	But grim to see is the gallows-tree,
	With its adder-bitten root,
	And, green or dry, a man must die
	Before it bears its fruit!

	The loftiest place is that seat of grace
140	For which all worldlings try:
	But who would stand in hempen band
	Upon a scaffold high,
	And through a murderer's collar take
	His last look at the sky?

145	It is sweet to dance to violins
	When Love and Life are fair:
	To dance to flutes, to dance to lutes
	Is delicate and rare:
	But it is not sweet with nimble feet
150	To dance upon the air!

	So with curious eyes and sick surmise
	We watched him day by day,
	And wondered if each one of us
	Would end the self-same way,
155	For none can tell to what red Hell
	His sightless soul may stray.

	At last the dead man walked no more
	Amongst the Trial Men,
	And I knew that he was standing up
160	In the black dock's dreadful pen,
	And that never would I see his face
	In God's sweet world again.

	Like two doomed ships that pass in storm
	We had crossed each other's way:
165	But we made no sign, we said no word,
	We had no word to say;
	For we did not meet in the holy night,
	But in the shameful day.

	A prison wall was round us both,
170	Two outcast men we were:
	The world had thrust us from its heart,
	And God from out His care:
	And the iron gin that waits for Sin
	Had caught us in its snare.

	III

175	In Debtors' Yard the stones are hard,
	And the dripping wall is high,
	So it was there he took the air
	Beneath the leaden sky,
	And by each side a Warder walked,
180	For fear the man might die.

	Or else he sat with those who watched
	His anguish night and day;
	Who watched him when he rose to weep,
	And when he crouched to pray;
185	Who watched him lest himself should rob
	Their scaffold of its prey.

	The Governor was strong upon
	The Regulations Act:
	The Doctor said that Death was but
190	A scientific fact:
	And twice a day the Chaplain called,
	And left a little tract.

	And twice a day he smoked his pipe,
	And drank his quart of beer:
195	His soul was resolute, and held
	No hiding-place for fear;
	He often said that he was glad
	The hangman's hands were near.

	But why he said so strange a thing
200	No Warder dared to ask:
	For he to whom a watcher's doom
	Is given as his task
	Must set a lock upon his lips,
	And make his face a mask.

205	Or else he might be moved, and try
	To comfort or console:
	And what should Human Pity do
	Pent up in Murderers' Hole?
	What word of grace in such a place
210	Could help a brother's soul?

	With slouch and swing around the ring
	We trod the Fools' Parade!
	We did not care: we knew we were
	The Devil's Own Brigade:
215	And shaven head and feet of lead
	Make a merry masquerade.

	We tore the tarry rope to shreds
	With blunt and bleeding nails;
	We rubbed the doors, and scrubbed the floors,
220	And cleaned the shining rails:
	And, rank by rank, we soaped the plank,
	And clattered with the pails.

	We sewed the sacks, we broke the stones,
	We turned the dusty drill:
225	We banged the tins, and bawled the hymns,
	And sweated on the mill:
	But in the heart of every man
	Terror was lying still.

	So still it lay that every day
230	Crawled like a weed-clogged wave:
	And we forgot the bitter lot
	That waits for fool and knave,
	Till once, as we tramped in from work,
	We passed an open grave.

235	With yawning mouth the yellow hole
	Gaped for a living thing;
	The very mud cried out for blood
	To the thirsty asphalt ring:
	And we knew that ere one dawn grew fair
240	Some prisoner had to swing.

	Right in we went, with soul intent
	On Death and Dread and Doom:
	The hangman, with his little bag,
	Went shuffling through the gloom:
245	And each man trembled as he crept
	Into his numbered tomb.

	That night the empty corridors
	Were full of forms of Fear,
	And up and down the iron town
250	Stole feet we could not hear,
	And through the bars that hide the stars
	White faces seemed to peer.

	He lay as one who lies and dreams
	In a pleasant meadow-land,
255	The watchers watched him as he slept,
	And could not understand
	How one could sleep so sweet a sleep
	With a hangman close at hand,

	But there is no sleep when men must weep
260	Who never yet have wept:
	So we -the fool, the fraud, the knave —
	That endless vigil kept,
	And through each brain on hands of pain
	Another's terror crept,

265	Alas! it is a fearful thing
	To feel another's guilt!
	For, right within, the sword of Sin
	Pierced to its poisoned hilt,
	And as molten lead were the tears we shed
270	For the blood we had not spilt.

	The Warders with their shoes of felt
	Crept by each padlocked door,
	And peeped and saw, with eyes of awe,
	Grey figures on the floor,
275	And wondered why men knelt to pray
	Who never prayed before.

	All through the night we knelt and prayed,
	Mad mourners of a corse!
	The troubled plumes of midnight were
280	The plumes upon a hearse:
	And bitter wine upon a sponge
	Was the savour of Remorse.

	The grey cock crew, the red cock crew,
	But never came the day:
285	And crooked shapes of Terror crouched,
	In the corners where we lay:
	And each evil sprite that walks by night
	Before us seemed to play.

	They glided past, they glided fast,
290	Like travellers through a mist:
	They mocked the moon in a rigadoon
	Of delicate turn and twist,
	And with formal pace and loathsome grace
	The phantoms kept their tryst,

295	With mop and mow, we saw them go,
	Slim shadows hand in hand:
	About, about, in ghostly rout
	They trod a saraband:
	And the damned grotesques made arabesques,
300	Like the wind upon the sand!

	With the pirouettes of marionettes,
	They tripped on pointed tread:
	But with flutes of Fear they filled the ear,
	As their grisly masque they led,
305	And loud they sang, and long they sang,
	For they sang to wake the dead.

	„Oho!“ they cried, „The world is wide,
	But fettered limbs go lame!
	And once, or twice, to throw the dice
310	Is a gentlemanly game,
	But he does not win who plays with Sin
	In the secret House of Shame.“

	No things of air these antics were,
	That frolicked with such glee:
315	To men whose lives were held in gyves
	And whose feet might not go free,
	Ah! wounds of Christ! they were living things,
	Most terrible to see.

	Around, around, they waltzed and wound;
320	Some wheeled in smirking pairs;
	With the mincing step of a demirep
	Some sidled up the stairs:
	And with subtle sneer, and fawning leer,
	Each helped us at our prayers.

325	The morning wind began to moan,
	But still the night went on:
	Through its giant loom the web of gloom
	Crept till each thread was spun:
	And, as we prayed, we grew afraid
330	Of the Justice of the Sun.

	The moaning wind went wandering round
	The weeping prison-wall:
	Till like a wheel of turning steel
	We felt the minutes crawl:
335	O moaning wind! what had we done
	To have such a seneschal?

	At last I saw the shadowed bars,
	Like a lattice wrought in lead,
	Move right across the whitewashed wall
340	That faced my three-plank bed,
	And I knew that somewhere in the world
	God's dreadful dawn was red.

	At six o'clock we cleaned our cells,
	At seven all was still,
345	But the sough and swing of a mighty wing
	The prison seemed to fill,
	For the Lord of Death with icy breath
	Had entered in to kill.

	He did not pass in purple pomp,
350	Nor ride a moon-white steed.
	Three yards of cord and a sliding board
	Are all the gallows' need:
	So with rope of shame the Herald came
	To do the secret deed.

355	We were as men who through a fen
	Of filthy darkness grope:
	We did not dare to breathe a prayer,
	Or to give our anguish scope:
	Something was dead in each of us,
360	And what was dead was Hope.

	For Man's grim Justice goes its way,
	And will not swerve aside:
	It slays the weak, it slays the strong,
	It has a deadly stride:
365	With iron heel it slays the strong,
	The monstrous parricide!

	We waited for the stroke of eight:
	Each tongue was thick with thirst:
	For the stroke of eight is the stroke of Fate
370	That makes a man accursed,
	And Fate will use a running noose
	For the best man and the worst.

	We had no other thing to do,
	Save to wait for the sign to come:
375	So, like things of stone in a valley lone,
	Quiet we sat and dumb:
	But each man's heart beat thick and quick,
	Like a madman on a drum!

	With sudden shock the prison-clock
380	Smote on the shivering air,
	And from all the gaol rose up a wail
	Of impotent despair,
	Like the sound that frightened marshes hear
	From some leper in his lair.

385	And as one sees most fearful things
	In the crystal of a dream,
	We saw the greasy hempen rope
	Hooked to the blackened beam,
	And heard the prayer the hangman's snare
390	Strangled into a scream.

	And all the woe that moved him so
	That he gave that bitter cry,
	And the wild regrets, and the bloody sweats,
	None knew so well as I:
395	For he who lives more lives than one
	More deaths than one must die.

	IV

	There is no chapel on the day
	On which they hang a man:
	The Chaplain's heart is far too sick,
400	Or his face is far too wan,
	Or there is that written in his eyes
	Which none should look upon.

	So they kept us close till nigh on noon,
	And then they rang the bell,
405	And the Warders with their jingling keys
	Opened each listening cell,
	And down the iron stair we tramped,
	Each from his separate Hell.

	Out into God's sweet air we went,
410	But not in wonted way,
	For this man's face was white with fear,
	And that man's face was grey,
	And I never saw sad men who looked
	So wistfully at the day.

415	I never saw sad men who looked
	With such a wistful eye
	Upon that little tent of blue
	We prisoners called the sky,
	And at every careless cloud that passed
420	In happy freedom by.

	But there were those amongst us all
	Who walked with downcast head,
	And knew that, had each got his due,
	They should have died instead:
425	He had but killed a thing that lived,
	Whilst they had killed the dead.

	For he who sins a second time
	Wakes a dead soul to pain,
	And draws it from its spotted shroud,
430	And makes it bleed again,
	And makes it bleed great gouts of blood,
	And makes it bleed in vain!

	Like ape or clown, in monstrous garb
	With crooked arrows starred,
435	Silently we went round and round
	The slippery asphalt yard;
	Silently we went round and round,
	And no man spoke a word.

	Silently we went round and round,
440	And through each hollow mind
	The Memory of dreadful things
	Rushed like a dreadful wind,
	And Horror stalked before each man,
	And Terror crept behind.

445	The Warders strutted up and down,
	And kept their herd of brutes,
	Their uniforms were spick and span,
	And they wore their Sunday suits,
	But we knew the work they had been at,
450	By the quicklime on their boots.

	For where a grave had opened wide,
	There was no grave at all:
	Only a stretch of mud and sand
	By the hideous prison-wall,
455	And a little heap of burning lime,
	That the man should have his pall.

	For he has a pall, this wretched man,
	Such as few men can claim:
	Deep down below a prison-yard,
460	Naked for greater shame,
	He lies, with fetters on each foot,
	Wrapped in a sheet of flame!

	And all the while the burning lime
	Eats flesh and bone away,
465	It eats the brittle bone by night,
	And the soft flesh by day,
	It eats the flesh and bone by turns,
	But it eats the heart alway.

	For three long years they will not sow
470	Or root or seedling there:
	For three long years the unblessed spot
	Will sterile be and bare,
	And look upon the wondering sky
	With unreproachful stare.

475	They think a murderer's heart would taint
	Each simple seed they sow.
	It is not true! God's kindly earth
	Is kindlier than men know,
	And the red rose would but blow more red,
480	The white rose whiter blow.

	Out of his mouth a red, red rose!
	Out of his heart a white!
	For who can say by what strange way,
	Christ brings His will to light,
485	Since the barren staff the pilgrim bore
	Bloomed in the great Pope's sight?

	But neither milk-white rose nor red
	May bloom in prison-air;
	The shard, the pebble, and the flint,
490	Are what they give us there:
	For flowers have been known to heal
	A common man's despair.

	So never will wine-red rose or white,
	Petal by petal, fall
495	On that stretch of mud and sand that lies
	By the hideous prison-wall,
	To tell the men who tramp the yard
	That God's Son died for all

	Yet though the hideous prison-wall
500	Still hems him round and round,
	And a spirit may not walk by night
	That is with fetters bound,
	And a spirit may but weep that lies
	In such unholy ground,

505	He is at peace -this wretched man —
	At peace, or will be soon:
	There is no thing to make him mad,
	Nor does Terror walk at noon,
	For the lampless Earth in which he lies
510	Has neither Sun nor Moon.

	They hanged him as a beast is hanged:
	They did not even toll
	A requiem that might have brought
	Rest to his startled soul,
515	But hurriedly they took him out,
	And hid him in a hole.

	They stripped him of his canvas clothes,
	And gave him to the flies:
	They mocked the swollen purple throat,
520	And the stark and staring eyes:
	And with laughter loud they heaped the shroud
	In which their convict lies.

	The Chaplain would not kneel to pray
	By his dishonoured grave:
525	Nor mark it with that blessed Cross
	That Christ for sinners gave,
	Because the man was one of those
	Whom Christ came down to save.

	Yet all is well; he has but passed
530	To Life's appointed bourne:
	And alien tears will fill for him
	Pity's long-broken urn,
	For his mourners will be outcast men,
	And outcasts always mourn.

	V

535	I know not whether Laws be right,
	Or whether Laws be wrong;
	All that we know who lie in gaol
	Is that the wall is strong;
	And that each day is like a year,
540	A year whose days are long.

	But this I know, that every Law
	That men have made for Man,
	Since first Man took his brother's life,
	And the sad world began,
545	But straws the wheat and saves the chaff
	With a most evil fan.

	This too I know -and wise it were
	If each could know the same —
	That every prison that men build
550	Is built with bricks of shame,
	And bound with bars lest Christ should see
	How men their brothers maim.

	With bars they blur the gracious moon,
	And blind the goodly sun:
555	And they do well to hide their Hell,
	For in it things are done
	That Son of God nor son of Man
	Ever should look upon!

	The vilest deeds like poison weeds,
560	Bloom well in prison-air;
	It is only what is good in Man
	That wastes and withers there:
	Pale Anguish keeps the heavy gate,
	And the Warder is Despair.

565	For they starve the little frightened child
	Till it weeps both night and day:
	And they scourge the weak, and flog the fool,
	And gibe the old and grey,
	And some grow mad, and all grow bad,
570	And none a word may say.

	Each narrow cell in which we dwell
	Is a foul and dark latrine,
	And the fetid breath of living Death
	Chokes up each grated screen,
575	And all, but Lust, is turned to dust
	In Humanity's machine.

	The brackish water that we drink
	Creeps with a loathsome slime,
	And the bitter bread they weigh in scales
580	Is full of chalk and lime,
	And Sleep will not lie down, but walks
	Wild-eyed, and cries to Time.

	But though lean Hunger and green Thirst
	Like asp with adder fight,
585	We have little care of prison fare,
	For what chills and kills outright
	Is that every stone one lifts by day
	Becomes one's heart by night.

	With midnight always in one's heart,
590	And twilight in one's cell,
	We turn the crank, or tear the rope,
	Each in his separate Hell,
	And the silence is more awful far
	Than the sound of a brazen bell.

595	And never a human voice comes near
	To speak a gentle word:
	And the eye that watches through the door
	Is pitiless and hard:
	And by all forgot, we rot and rot,
600	With soul and body marred.

	And thus we rust Life's iron chain
	Degraded and alone:
	And some men curse, and some men weep,
	And some men make no moan:
605	But God's eternal Laws are kind
	And break the heart of stone.

	And every human heart that breaks,
	In prison-cell or yard,
	Is as that broken box that gave
610	Its treasure to the Lord,
	And filled the unclean leper's house
	With the scent of costliest nard.

	Ah! happy they whose hearts can break
	And peace of pardon win!
615	How else may man make straight his plan
	And cleanse his soul from Sin?
	How else but through a broken heart
	May Lord Christ enter in?

	And he of the swollen purple throat,
620	And the stark and staring eyes,
	Waits for the holy hands that took
	The Thief to Paradise;
	And a broken and a contrite heart
	The Lord will not despise.

625	The man in red who reads the Law
	Gave him three weeks of life,
	Three little weeks in which to heal
	His soul of his soul's strife,
	And cleanse from every blot of blood
630	The hand that held the knife.

	And with tears of blood he cleansed the hand,
	The hand that held the steel:
	For only blood can wipe out blood,
	And only tears can heal:
635	And the crimson stain that was of Cain
	Became Christ's snow-white seal.

	VI

	In Reading gaol by Reading town
	There is a pit of shame,
	And in it lies a wretched man
640	Eaten by teeth of flame,
	In a burning winding-sheet he lies,
	And his grave has got no name.

	And there, till Christ call forth the dead,
	In silence let him lie:
645	No need to waste the foolish tear,
	Or heave the windy sigh:
	The man had killed the thing he loved,
	And so he had to die.

	And all men kill the thing they love,
650	By all let this be heard,
	Some do it with a bitter look,
	Some with a flattering word,
	The coward does it with a kiss,
	The brave man with a sword!

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