Upton Sinclair, ed. (1878–1968). rn The Cry for Justice: An Anthology of the Literature of Social Protest. 1915.

Priests
(From “Songs for the New Age”)

James Oppenheim

(American poet and novelist; born 1882)

PRIESTS are in bad odor,

And yet there shall be no lack of them.

The skies shall not lack a spokesman,

Nor the spirit of man a voice and a gesture.

Not garbed nor churched,

Yet, as of old, in loneliness and anguish,

They shall come eating and drinking among us,

With scourge, pity, and prayer.