A Cold Coming

If that strange patience could regenerate In stark twilight, to an alien race, What common Lord could the disloyal have? No deadly forfeit, no dumb child-king, No sudden chill of some sharp glory Or the three-fold terror of love. That deviant passion would fall hard And cold, on a people Like rain-beaten stones; A son still-born to bestial kin Who, too dead to demand a miracle, Would not have it again.