![]() | The source document of this text is not known. Please see this document's talk page for details for verification. "Source" means a location at which other users can find a copy of this work. Ideally this will be a scanned copy of the original that can be uploaded to Wikimedia Commons and proofread. If not, it is preferably a URL; if one is not available, please explain on the talk page. |
![]() | This page does not provide license information. Pages with no license information may be nominated for deletion. If you'd like to help, see Help:Copyright tags or comment. |
"A Rattlesnake Sings in the Grass" is an unpublished, probably lost poem of Robert E. Howard's that expanded “Hymn of Hatred” from the Always Come Evening anthology. An 8-line passage that would have been placed between lines 8 and 9 of "Hymn" has never turned up.
Hymn of Hatred
Oh, brother coiling in the acrid grass,
Lift not for me your sibilant refrain:
Less deadly venom slavers from your fangs
Than courses fiercely in my every vein.
A single victim satisfied your hate,
But I would see walled cities crash and reel,
Gray-bearded sages blown from cannon-mouths,
And infants spitted on the reddened steel.
And I would see the stars come thundering down,
The foaming oceans break their brimming bowl –
Oh, universal ruin would not serve
To glut the fury of my maddened soul!