Thou shalt not muzzle the ox
that treadeth out the corn,
making straw for the bricks of Egypt,
nor spare the arms that endlessly
winnow the grain in the wind
to separate the wheat from the chaff
wheat borne stolidly
on the backs of countless slaves
from the heavy-laden Nile boats
to the teeming shore.

Endlessly they plod
beneath the sheaves of wheat
and endlessly return for more.

A golden harvest to the threshers,
a grain safe to feed the masters,
bitterness to feed the slaves,
and to feed the brick pits, straw,
carried on the bowed backs of women
down into the never-ending valley
of toil and agony,
stretching mile after mile.

An inferno of mud-soaked bodies,
where the treaders’ feet
churn clay and straw
into the mixture
for the Pharaoh ’s bricks.

And everywhere the lash
of watchful taskmasters
ready to sting the backs of the weary.

Blades chopping straw.
Mattocks chopping clay.
A ceaseless cycle of unending drudgery.

From the mixing feet of treaders
to the pouring hands of brick molders
moves the constant stream of mud,
the lowly seed of tall cities,
day after day, year after year;
century after century.

Bondage without rest,
toil without reward.

These are the children of misery,
the afflicted,
the hopeless, the oppressed.

And he went out unto his brethren
and looked on their burdens.

— The Ten Commandments, 1956