Torquemada by Madison Cawein

_To the Chapter of the Archbishop of Toledo._

/ What doth the Archbishop, his chapter of / Toledo? -- Yea! doze they above some Bull -- / Some dull dry Bull Pope Sextus sent to rot? / Come, come! awake! O prelates militant! / Hear me! this is a truth I whisper now: / Spain's King is less than king as I am less / Than Paul the Apostle. -- Look you! look around; / Observe and dare! -- I write above my seal, / A grave Dominican, to postulate / Pacheco, Marquis de Villena, croaks / No nonsense in your excellencies' ears: / King Henry's heir _is_ illegitimate! / Blanche of Navarre cast off, his Impotence / Gave us a wanton out of Portugal / For Queen; Joanna, who bore him this heir / The cuckold King parades, a bastard, now.

/ Look! all the Court laughs -- secretly: but masks / Are but for slaves; the people's smile is free / From all concealment; and the word still wags / About this son, -- who is his favorite's, / Bertrand la Cueva's, handsome exquisite, -- / Whom, people say, -- and what they say is true, -- / The King himself, needing a lusty heir, / Made warm familiar with Joanna's bed. / What shall we do? endorse the infamy? / Absolve them? -- Yea! absolve them -- at the stake! / Or, if not that, then with the axe that hews / The neck of State asunder! -- Is it well, / Prelates and ministers?

/ Be merciful? -- / Lest the disease of this delicious fruit, / This Kingdom of Castile, corrode the core, / Why not pare off all rottenness and leave / The healthy pulp! The throne, the populace, / The Church, and God demand the overthrow, / Deponement or the abnegation of / This Henry, named the Fourth, the impotent! -- / Alphonso lives. (It is my guarded hope / That brothers of such kings have no long life.) --

/ Am I impatient? 'Tis the tonsure then; / Ambition ever was and aye will be / Cousined to fierce impatience. 'Tis the cowl, / The tonsure and the cowl, _they_ must advance! / My native town, Valladolid, did sow / The priestly germ, ambition, first in me; / Rather 'twas planted there in me; and had, / Despite the richness of the soil, poor growth / And less encouragement; the nipping wind / Of Court disfavor was too much for it; / And so I bore it thence to Cordova, / And sunned its torpor in a woman's smile, / 'Neath which it sprouted but -- who trusts the sex? -- / Grew to a tenderness too insecure / For love's black frosts. Required hardiness, / And found it there at Zaragossa; (where / Fat father Lopés, bluff Dominican, / My youth confuted with wise nonsense, and / Astonished Spain in disputation in / The public controversies of the monks).

/ Transplanted to the Court, oh, splendid speed! / Sure hath its growth been. Now a Cardinal's red / Is promised by the bud that tops its stem. / How have I, through the saintly medium / Of the confessional, impressed the ear / Of Isabella, daughter and dear child! / The incarnation of my dear ideal, / Pure crucifix of my religious love, / Sweet cross which my ambition guards and holds: / Ploughed up the early meadows of her soul / For fruitful increase! in her maiden heart / Insinuated subtleties of seed / Shall ripen to a queen crowned with a crown / From welded gold of Arragon and Castile! / How I this son of John, the Second named, / Prince Ferdinand of swarthy Arragon, -- / (Grant absolution, holy mother mine! / Thus thy advancement and thy mastery / Would I obtain! ) -- have on her fancy limned / In morning colors of proud chivalry.!

/ Till he a sceptered paladin of love / And beaming manhood stands! She dreams, she dreams / What -- Heaven knows! 'Tis, haply, of a star / She saw when but a babe and in the arms / Of some old nurse. A star, that laughed above / A space of Moorish balcony that hung / Above a water full of upset stars; / Reflected glimmers of old palace fêtes: / A star she reached for, cried for, claimed her own, / But never got; that blew young promises, / Court promises, centupled, from the tips / Of golden fingers at her infant eyes. -- / Well! when this girl is grown to be a queen, / What if one, Torquemada, clothe her star / In palpable approach and give it her! --

/ When she is Queen, three steadfast purposes / Have grown their causes to divine results. -- / No young imagination did I train / With such endeavor and for no reward. -- / How often have I told her of the things / She could perform when Queen, while silently / And pensively she sat and, leaning, heard, / Absorbed upon my face! her missal, -- crushed / By one propped elbow, its bent, careless leaves / Rich with illuminated capitals / Of gold and purple, -- open on her lap. / Long, long we sat thus, brothers, speaking of / Felicity; discoursing earnestly / Of Earth and Heaven; and of who adhere / To God's true Vicar and our Holy Church: / Beatitude and all the ceaseless bliss, / Celestial, of eternal Paradise, / As everlasting as the souls that have / Built a strong tower for the only Faith.

/ And I recall now how, in exhortation, / Filled with the fervor of my cause I cried: -- / "Walk not on ways that lead but to despair, / The easy ways of Satan! Rather thorns / For naked feet that will not falter if / Retentive of the arm of our true Church, / Who comforts weariness with promises / Still urging onward; and refreshes hearts / With whisperings in the tuneless ear of Care. " -- / And oft, big-eyed with innocence, she asked, / "Do some digress? " -- And I, "Yea, many! yea! / And there's necessity! we should annul, / Pluck forth the canker that contaminates, / Corrodes the milk-white beauty of our Rose. -- / God's persecution! they confront our Faith / With brows of stigmatizing error writ / In Hell's red handwriting. Shall such persist? / No! -- Heaven demands an end to all this shame! " -- / Her pledge she gave me then: "When Queen, for Spain / The Inquisition! Let the Saints record! / I promise thee, my father, thou shalt be / A mattock of deracination to / Extirpate heresy."