(_The New Armenia_)
Through all this golden sunshine there peals a mournful cry,
Help, help us, or we perish--help, help us, or we die!
Our babes are begging wildly for one small crust of bread,
They faint, they die with hunger--is there a God o’erhead?
Oh, haste with friendly succor, we are starving while we wait,
To thousands sinking graveward your help may come too late;
Our gaunt forms totter feebly; our lips grow wan and white,
Oh, God, how hard it is to starve beneath a sky so bright!
Your hearths are crowned with plenty, your homes with blessings rife;
The scattered crumbs that strew your floor might save a human life;
Oh, can you hear, unmoved and calm, of all our bitter need,
Nor feel your quivering heart-strings with throbs of pity bleed?
Dear brethren, would ye follow Christ, our starving children save,
Keep back the shuddering feet that tread the margin of the grave;
Send on your bounty quickly, with timely comfort haste,
For human lives are ebbing out each moment that you waste.
I