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EPIGRAM by GEORGE SANTAYANA

Poet Analysis

First Line: THREE SORROWS, THREE INVISIBLE SWORDS ARE NAILED
Last Line: THAT VANQUISHED SPAIN AND FRIENDSHIP AND THE GODS.
Subject(s): SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR (1898);

Three sorrows, three invisible swords are nailed
In this cold heart, and all my hopes have failed.
First the gods perished to whom men had prayed
Cradled in fancy; them the truth betrayed,
Then time, the world, and ah! the fangs of lust
Embittered Love, and dragged it in the dust.
Last my sad country, 'mid a rabble's jeers,
Suffered the outrage of the treacherous years.
||Now|| too, high-meted soul, tho' stricken, proud
Enough for silence and the common shroud.
Bow; meet contented the ignoble odds
That vanquished Spain and Friendship and the Gods.



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