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Best Famous Beckoned Poems

Here is a collection of the all-time best famous Beckoned poems. This is a select list of the best famous Beckoned poetry. Reading, writing, and enjoying famous Beckoned poetry (as well as classical and contemporary poems) is a great past time. These top poems are the best examples of beckoned poems.

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Written by Alan Seeger | Create an image from this poem

The Wanderer

 To see the clouds his spirit yearned toward so 
Over new mountains piled and unploughed waves, 
Back of old-storied spires and architraves 
To watch Arcturus rise or Fomalhaut,

And roused by street-cries in strange tongues when day 
Flooded with gold some domed metropolis, 
Between new towers to waken and new bliss 
Spread on his pillow in a wondrous way:

These were his joys. Oft under bulging crates, 
Coming to market with his morning load, 
The peasant found him early on his road 
To greet the sunrise at the city-gates,---

There where the meadows waken in its rays, 
Golden with mist, and the great roads commence, 
And backward, where the chimney-tops are dense, 
Cathedral-arches glimmer through the haze.

White dunes that breaking show a strip of sea, 
A plowman and his team against the blue 
Swiss pastures musical with cowbells, too, 
And poplar-lined canals in Picardie,

And coast-towns where the vultures back and forth
Sail in the clear depths of the tropic sky,
And swallows in the sunset where they fly
Over gray Gothic cities in the north,

And the wine-cellar and the chorus there,
The dance-hall and a face among the crowd,---
Were all delights that made him sing aloud 
For joy to sojourn in a world so fair.

Back of his footsteps as he journeyed fell 
Range after range; ahead blue hills emerged. 
Before him tireless to applaud it surged 
The sweet interminable spectacle.

And like the west behind a sundown sea 
Shone the past joys his memory retraced, 
And bright as the blue east he always faced 
Beckoned the loves and joys that were to be.

From every branch a blossom for his brow 
He gathered, singing down Life's flower-lined road, 
And youth impelled his spirit as he strode 
Like winged Victory on the galley's prow.

That Loveliness whose being sun and star,
Green Earth and dawn and amber evening robe,
That lamp whereof the opalescent globe
The season's emulative splendors are,

That veiled divinity whose beams transpire 
From every pore of universal space,
As the fair soul illumes the lovely face---
That was his guest, his passion, his desire.

His heart the love of Beauty held as hides 
One gem most pure a casket of pure gold. 
It was too rich a lesser thing to bold;
It was not large enough for aught besides.


Written by Carl Sandburg | Create an image from this poem

The Four Brothers

 MAKE war songs out of these;
Make chants that repeat and weave.
Make rhythms up to the ragtime chatter of the machine guns;
Make slow-booming psalms up to the boom of the big guns.
Make a marching song of swinging arms and swinging legs,
 Going along,
 Going along,
On the roads from San Antonio to Athens, from Seattle to Bagdad—
The boys and men in winding lines of khaki, the circling squares of bayonet points.

Cowpunchers, cornhuskers, shopmen, ready in khaki;
Ballplayers, lumberjacks, ironworkers, ready in khaki;
A million, ten million, singing, “I am ready.”
This the sun looks on between two seaboards,
In the land of Lincoln, in the land of Grant and Lee.

I heard one say, “I am ready to be killed.”
I heard another say, “I am ready to be killed.”
O sunburned clear-eyed boys!
I stand on sidewalks and you go by with drums and guns and bugles,
 You—and the flag!
And my heart tightens, a fist of something feels my throat
 When you go by,
You on the kaiser hunt, you and your faces saying, “I am ready to be killed.”

They are hunting death,
Death for the one-armed mastoid kaiser.
They are after a Hohenzollern head:
There is no man-hunt of men remembered like this.

The four big brothers are out to kill.
France, Russia, Britain, America—
The four republics are sworn brothers to kill the kaiser.

Yes, this is the great man-hunt;
And the sun has never seen till now
Such a line of toothed and tusked man-killers,
In the blue of the upper sky,
In the green of the undersea,
In the red of winter dawns.
Eating to kill,
Sleeping to kill,
Asked by their mothers to kill,
Wished by four-fifths of the world to kill—
To cut the kaiser’s throat,
To hack the kaiser’s head,
To hang the kaiser on a high-horizon gibbet.

And is it nothing else than this?
Three times ten million men thirsting the blood
Of a half-cracked one-armed child of the German kings?
Three times ten million men asking the blood
Of a child born with his head wrong-shaped,
The blood of rotted kings in his veins?
If this were all, O God,
I would go to the far timbers
And look on the gray wolves
Tearing the throats of moose:
I would ask a wilder drunk of blood.

Look! It is four brothers in joined hands together.
 The people of bleeding France,
 The people of bleeding Russia,
 The people of Britain, the people of America—
These are the four brothers, these are the four republics.

At first I said it in anger as one who clenches his fist in wrath to fling his knuckles into the face of some one taunting;
Now I say it calmly as one who has thought it over and over again at night, among the mountains, by the seacombers in storm.
I say now, by God, only fighters to-day will save the world, nothing but fighters will keep alive the names of those who left red prints of bleeding feet at Valley Forge in Christmas snow.
On the cross of Jesus, the sword of Napoleon, the skull of Shakespeare, the pen of Tom Jefferson, the ashes of Abraham Lincoln, or any sign of the red and running life poured out by the mothers of the world,
By the God of morning glories climbing blue the doors of quiet homes, by the God of tall hollyhocks laughing glad to children in peaceful valleys, by the God of new mothers wishing peace to sit at windows nursing babies,
I swear only reckless men, ready to throw away their lives by hunger, deprivation, desperate clinging to a single purpose imperturbable and undaunted, men with the primitive guts of rebellion,
Only fighters gaunt with the red brand of labor’s sorrow on their brows and labor’s terrible pride in their blood, men with souls asking danger—only these will save and keep the four big brothers.

Good-night is the word, good-night to the kings, to the czars,
 Good-night to the kaiser.
The breakdown and the fade-away begins.
The shadow of a great broom, ready to sweep out the trash, is here.

One finger is raised that counts the czar,
The ghost who beckoned men who come no more—
The czar gone to the winds on God’s great dustpan,
The czar a pinch of nothing,
The last of the gibbering Romanoffs.

Out and good-night—
The ghosts of the summer palaces
And the ghosts of the winter palaces!
Out and out, good-night to the kings, the czars, the kaisers.

Another finger will speak,
And the kaiser, the ghost who gestures a hundred million sleeping-waking ghosts,
The kaiser will go onto God’s great dustpan—
The last of the gibbering Hohenzollerns.
Look! God pities this trash, God waits with a broom and a dustpan,
God knows a finger will speak and count them out.

It is written in the stars;
It is spoken on the walls;
It clicks in the fire-white zigzag of the Atlantic wireless;
It mutters in the bastions of thousand-mile continents;
It sings in a whistle on the midnight winds from Walla Walla to Mesopotamia:
Out and good-night.

The millions slow in khaki,
The millions learning Turkey in the Straw and John Brown’s Body,
The millions remembering windrows of dead at Gettysburg, Chickamauga, and Spottsylvania Court House,
The millions dreaming of the morning star of Appomattox,
The millions easy and calm with guns and steel, planes and prows:
 There is a hammering, drumming hell to come.
 The killing gangs are on the way.

God takes one year for a job.
God takes ten years or a million.
God knows when a doom is written.
God knows this job will be done and the words spoken:
Out and good-night.
 The red tubes will run,
 And the great price be paid,
 And the homes empty,
 And the wives wishing,
 And the mothers wishing.

There is only one way now, only the way of the red tubes and the great price.

 Well…
Maybe the morning sun is a five-cent yellow balloon,
And the evening stars the joke of a God gone crazy.
Maybe the mothers of the world,
And the life that pours from their torsal folds—
Maybe it’s all a lie sworn by liars,
And a God with a cackling laughter says:
“I, the Almighty God,
I have made all this,
I have made it for kaisers, czars, and kings.”

Three times ten million men say: No.
Three times ten million men say:
 God is a God of the People.
And the God who made the world
 And fixed the morning sun,
 And flung the evening stars,
 And shaped the baby hands of life,
This is the God of the Four Brothers;
This is the God of bleeding France and bleeding Russia;
This is the God of the people of Britain and America.

The graves from the Irish Sea to the Caucasus peaks are ten times a million.
The stubs and stumps of arms and legs, the eyesockets empty, the cripples, ten times a million.
The crimson thumb-print of this anathema is on the door panels of a hundred million homes.
Cows gone, mothers on sick-beds, children cry a hunger and no milk comes in the noon-time or at night.
The death-yells of it all, the torn throats of men in ditches calling for water, the shadows and the hacking lungs in dugouts, the steel paws that clutch and squeeze a scarlet drain day by day—the storm of it is hell.
But look! child! the storm is blowing for a clean air.

Look! the four brothers march
And hurl their big shoulders
And swear the job shall be done.

Out of the wild finger-writing north and south, east and west, over the blood-crossed, blood-dusty ball of earth,
Out of it all a God who knows is sweeping clean,
Out of it all a God who sees and pierces through, is breaking and cleaning out an old thousand years, is making ready for a new thousand years.
The four brothers shall be five and more.

Under the chimneys of the winter time the children of the world shall sing new songs.
Among the rocking restless cradles the mothers of the world shall sing new sleepy-time songs.
Written by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow | Create an image from this poem

Hiawathas Fishing

 Forth upon the Gitche Gumee, 
On the shining Big-Sea-Water, 
With his fishing-line of cedar, 
Of the twisted bark of cedar, 
Forth to catch the sturgeon Nahma, 
Mishe-Nahma, King of Fishes, 
In his birch canoe exulting 
All alone went Hiawatha.
Through the clear, transparent water 
He could see the fishes swimming 
Far down in the depths below him; 
See the yellow perch, the Sahwa, 
Like a sunbeam in the water,
See the Shawgashee, the craw-fish, 
Like a spider on the bottom, 
On the white and sandy bottom.
At the stern sat Hiawatha, 
With his fishing-line of cedar; 
In his plumes the breeze of morning 
Played as in the hemlock branches; 
On the bows, with tail erected, 
Sat the squirrel, Adjidaumo; 
In his fur the breeze of morning 
Played as in the prairie grasses.
On the white sand of the bottom 
Lay the monster Mishe-Nahma, 
Lay the sturgeon, King of Fishes; 
Through his gills he breathed the water, 
With his fins he fanned and winnowed, 
With his tail he swept the sand-floor.
There he lay in all his armor; 
On each side a shield to guard him, 
Plates of bone upon his forehead, 
Down his sides and back and shoulders
Plates of bone with spines projecting 
Painted was he with his war-paints, 
Stripes of yellow, red, and azure, 
Spots of brown and spots of sable; 
And he lay there on the bottom, 
Fanning with his fins of purple, 
As above him Hiawatha 
In his birch canoe came sailing, 
With his fishing-line of cedar.
"Take my bait," cried Hiawatha, 
Dawn into the depths beneath him, 
"Take my bait, O Sturgeon, Nahma! 
Come up from below the water, 
Let us see which is the stronger!" 
And he dropped his line of cedar 
Through the clear, transparent water, 
Waited vainly for an answer, 
Long sat waiting for an answer, 
And repeating loud and louder, 
"Take my bait, O King of Fishes!"
Quiet lay the sturgeon, Nahma, 
Fanning slowly in the water, 
Looking up at Hiawatha, 
Listening to his call and clamor, 
His unnecessary tumult, 
Till he wearied of the shouting; 
And he said to the Kenozha, 
To the pike, the Maskenozha, 
"Take the bait of this rude fellow, 
Break the line of Hiawatha!"
In his fingers Hiawatha 
Felt the loose line jerk and tighten, 
As he drew it in, it tugged so 
That the birch canoe stood endwise, 
Like a birch log in the water, 
With the squirrel, Adjidaumo, 
Perched and frisking on the summit.
Full of scorn was Hiawatha 
When he saw the fish rise upward, 
Saw the pike, the Maskenozha, 
Coming nearer, nearer to him, 
And he shouted through the water, 
"Esa! esa! shame upon you! 
You are but the pike, Kenozha, 
You are not the fish I wanted, 
You are not the King of Fishes!"
Reeling downward to the bottom 
Sank the pike in great confusion, 
And the mighty sturgeon, Nahma, 
Said to Ugudwash, the sun-fish, 
To the bream, with scales of crimson, 
"Take the bait of this great boaster, 
Break the line of Hiawatha!"
Slowly upward, wavering, gleaming, 
Rose the Ugudwash, the sun-fish, 
Seized the line of Hiawatha, 
Swung with all his weight upon it, 
Made a whirlpool in the water, 
Whirled the birch canoe in circles, 
Round and round in gurgling eddies, 
Till the circles in the water 
Reached the far-off sandy beaches, 
Till the water-flags and rushes 
Nodded on the distant margins.
But when Hiawatha saw him 
Slowly rising through the water, 
Lifting up his disk refulgent, 
Loud he shouted in derision, 
"Esa! esa! shame upon you! 
You are Ugudwash, the sun-fish, 
You are not the fish I wanted, 
You are not the King of Fishes!"
Slowly downward, wavering, gleaming, 
Sank the Ugudwash, the sun-fish, 
And again the sturgeon, Nahma, 
Heard the shout of Hiawatha,
Heard his challenge of defiance, 
The unnecessary tumult, 
Ringing far across the water.
From the white sand of the bottom 
Up he rose with angry gesture, 
Quivering in each nerve and fibre, 
Clashing all his plates of armor, 
Gleaming bright with all his war-paint; 
In his wrath he darted upward, 
Flashing leaped into the sunshine, 
Opened his great jaws, and swallowed 
Both canoe and Hiawatha.
Down into that darksome cavern 
Plunged the headlong Hiawatha, 
As a log on some black river 
Shoots and plunges down the rapids, 
Found himself in utter darkness, 
Groped about in helpless wonder, 
Till he felt a great heart beating, 
Throbbing in that utter darkness.
And he smote it in his anger, 
With his fist, the heart of Nahma, 
Felt the mighty King of Fishes 
Shudder through each nerve and fibre, 
Heard the water gurgle round him 
As he leaped and staggered through it, 
Sick at heart, and faint and weary.
Crosswise then did Hiawatha 
Drag his birch-canoe for safety, 
Lest from out the jaws of Nahma, 
In the turmoil and confusion, 
Forth he might be hurled and perish. 
And the squirrel, Adjidaumo, 
Frisked and chatted very gayly, 
Toiled and tugged with Hiawatha 
Till the labor was completed.
Then said Hiawatha to him, 
"O my little friend, the squirrel,
Bravely have you toiled to help me; 
Take the thanks of Hiawatha, 
And the name which now he gives you; 
For hereafter and forever 
Boys shall call you Adjidaumo, 
Tail-in-air the boys shall call you!"
And again the sturgeon, Nahma, 
Gasped and quivered in the water, 
Then was still, and drifted landward 
Till he grated on the pebbles, 
Till the listening Hiawatha 
Heard him grate upon the margin, 
Felt him strand upon the pebbles, 
Knew that Nahma, King of Fishes, 
Lay there dead upon the margin.
Then he heard a clang and flapping, 
As of many wings assembling, 
Heard a screaming and confusion, 
As of birds of prey contending, 
Saw a gleam of light above him, 
Shining through the ribs of Nahma, 
Saw the glittering eyes of sea-gulls, 
Of Kayoshk, the sea-gulls, peering, 
Gazing at him through the opening, 
Heard them saying to each other, 
"'T is our brother, Hiawatha!"
And he shouted from below them, 
Cried exulting from the caverns: 
"O ye sea-gulls! O my brothers! 
I have slain the sturgeon, Nahma; 
Make the rifts a little larger, 
With your claws the openings widen, 
Set me free from this dark prison, 
And henceforward and forever 
Men shall speak of your achievements, 
Calling you Kayoshk, the sea-gulls, 
Yes, Kayoshk, the Noble Scratchers!"
And the wild and clamorous sea-gulls
Toiled with beak and claws together, 
Made the rifts and openings wider 
In the mighty ribs of Nahma, 
And from peril and from prison, 
From the body of the sturgeon, 
From the peril of the water, 
They released my Hiawatha.
He was standing near his wigwam, 
On the margin of the water, 
And he called to old Nokomis, 
Called and beckoned to Nokomis, 
Pointed to the sturgeon, Nahma, 
Lying lifeless on the pebbles, 
With the sea-gulls feeding on him.
"I have slain the Mishe-Nahma,
Slain the King of Fishes!" said he' 
"Look! the sea-gulls feed upon him,
Yes, my friends Kayoshk, the sea-gulls; 
Drive them not away, Nokomis, 
They have saved me from great peril 
In the body of the sturgeon, 
Wait until their meal is ended, 
Till their craws are full with feasting, 
Till they homeward fly, at sunset, 
To their nests among the marshes; 
Then bring all your pots and kettles, 
And make oil for us in Winter."
And she waited till the sun set, 
Till the pallid moon, the Night-sun, 
Rose above the tranquil water, 
Till Kayoshk, the sated sea-gulls, 
From their banquet rose with clamor, 
And across the fiery sunset 
Winged their way to far-off islands, 
To their nests among the rushes.
To his sleep went Hiawatha, 
And Nokomis to her labor, 
Toiling patient in the moonlight,
Till the sun and moon changed places, 
Till the sky was red with sunrise, 
And Kayoshk, the hungry sea-gulls, 
Came back from the reedy islands, 
Clamorous for their morning banquet.
Three whole days and nights alternate 
Old Nokomis and the sea-gulls 
Stripped the oily flesh of Nahma, 
Till the waves washed through the rib-bones, 
Till the sea-gulls came no longer, 
And upon the sands lay nothing 
But the skeleton of Nahma.
Written by Friedrich von Schiller | Create an image from this poem

The Gods Of Greece

 Ye in the age gone by,
Who ruled the world--a world how lovely then!--
And guided still the steps of happy men
In the light leading-strings of careless joy!
Ah, flourished then your service of delight!
How different, oh, how different, in the day
When thy sweet fanes with many a wreath were bright,
O Venus Amathusia!

Then, through a veil of dreams
Woven by song, truth's youthful beauty glowed,
And life's redundant and rejoicing streams
Gave to the soulless, soul--where'r they flowed
Man gifted nature with divinity
To lift and link her to the breast of love;
All things betrayed to the initiate eye
The track of gods above!

Where lifeless--fixed afar,
A flaming ball to our dull sense is given,
Phoebus Apollo, in his golden car,
In silent glory swept the fields of heaven!
On yonder hill the Oread was adored,
In yonder tree the Dryad held her home;
And from her urn the gentle Naiad poured
The wavelet's silver foam.

Yon bay, chaste Daphne wreathed,
Yon stone was mournful Niobe's mute cell,
Low through yon sedges pastoral Syrinx breathed,
And through those groves wailed the sweet Philomel,
The tears of Ceres swelled in yonder rill--
Tears shed for Proserpine to Hades borne;
And, for her lost Adonis, yonder hill
Heard Cytherea mourn!--

Heaven's shapes were charmed unto
The mortal race of old Deucalion;
Pyrrha's fair daughter, humanly to woo,
Came down, in shepherd-guise, Latona's son
Between men, heroes, gods, harmonious then
Love wove sweet links and sympathies divine;
Blest Amathusia, heroes, gods, and men,
Equals before thy shrine!

Not to that culture gay,
Stern self-denial, or sharp penance wan!
Well might each heart be happy in that day--
For gods, the happy ones, were kin to man!
The beautiful alone the holy there!
No pleasure shamed the gods of that young race;
So that the chaste Camoenae favoring were,
And the subduing grace!

A palace every shrine;
Your sports heroic;--yours the crown
Of contests hallowed to a power divine,
As rushed the chariots thundering to renown.
Fair round the altar where the incense breathed,
Moved your melodious dance inspired; and fair
Above victorious brows, the garland wreathed
Sweet leaves round odorous hair!

The lively Thyrsus-swinger,
And the wild car the exulting panthers bore,
Announced the presence of the rapture-bringer--
Bounded the Satyr and blithe Faun before;
And Maenads, as the frenzy stung the soul,
Hymned in their maddening dance, the glorious wine--
As ever beckoned to the lusty bowl
The ruddy host divine!

Before the bed of death
No ghastly spectre stood--but from the porch
Of life, the lip--one kiss inhaled the breath,
And the mute graceful genius lowered a torch.
The judgment-balance of the realms below,
A judge, himself of mortal lineage, held;
The very furies at the Thracian's woe,
Were moved and music-spelled.

In the Elysian grove
The shades renewed the pleasures life held dear:
The faithful spouse rejoined remembered love,
And rushed along the meads the charioteer;
There Linus poured the old accustomed strain;
Admetus there Alcestis still could greet; his
Friend there once more Orestes could regain,
His arrows--Philoctetes!

More glorious than the meeds
That in their strife with labor nerved the brave,
To the great doer of renowned deeds
The Hebe and the heaven the Thunderer gave.
Before the rescued rescuer [10] of the dead,
Bowed down the silent and immortal host;
And the twain stars [11] their guiding lustre shed,
On the bark tempest-tossed!

Art thou, fair world, no more?
Return, thou virgin-bloom on Nature's face;
Ah, only on the minstrel's magic shore,
Can we the footstep of sweet fable trace!
The meadows mourn for the old hallowing life;
Vainly we search the earth of gods bereft;
Where once the warm and living shapes were rife,
Shadows alone are left!

Cold, from the north, has gone
Over the flowers the blast that killed their May;
And, to enrich the worship of the one,
A universe of gods must pass away!
Mourning, I search on yonder starry steeps,
But thee no more, Selene, there I see!
And through the woods I call, and o'er the deeps,
And--Echo answers me!

Deaf to the joys she gives--
Blind to the pomp of which she is possessed--
Unconscious of the spiritual power that lives
Around, and rules her--by our bliss unblessed--
Dull to the art that colors or creates,
Like the dead timepiece, godless nature creeps
Her plodding round, and, by the leaden weights,
The slavish motion keeps.

To-morrow to receive
New life, she digs her proper grave to-day;
And icy moons with weary sameness weave
From their own light their fulness and decay.
Home to the poet's land the gods are flown,
Light use in them that later world discerns,
Which, the diviner leading-strings outgrown,
On its own axle turns.

Home! and with them are gone
The hues they gazed on and the tones they heard;
Life's beauty and life's melody:--alone
Broods o'er the desolate void, the lifeless word;
Yet rescued from time's deluge, still they throng
Unseen the Pindus they were wont to cherish:
All, that which gains immortal life in song,
To mortal life must perish!
Written by Mac Hammond | Create an image from this poem

Halloween

 The butcher knife goes in, first, at the top
And carves out the round stemmed lid,
The hole of which allows the hand to go 
In to pull the gooey mess inside, out -
The walls scooped clean with a spoon.
A grim design decided on, that afternoon,
The eyes are the first to go,
Isosceles or trapezoid, the square nose,
The down-turned mouth with three
Hideous teeth and, sometimes,
Round ears. At dusk it's
Lighted, the room behind it dark.
Outside, looking in, it looks like a 
Pumpkin, it looks like ripeness
Is all. Kids come, beckoned by
Fingers of shadows on leaf-strewn lawns
To trick or treat. Standing at the open
Door, the sculptor, a warlock, drops
Penny candies into their bags, knowing
The message of winter: only the children,
Pretending to be ghosts, are real.


Written by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow | Create an image from this poem

Hiawathas Fasting

 You shall hear how Hiawatha 
Prayed and fasted in the forest, 
Not for greater skill in hunting, 
Not for greater craft in fishing, 
Not for triumphs in the battle, 
And renown among the warriors, 
But for profit of the people, 
For advantage of the nations.
First he built a lodge for fasting, 
Built a wigwam in the forest, 
By the shining Big-Sea-Water, 
In the blithe and pleasant Spring-time, 
In the Moon of Leaves he built it,
And, with dreams and visions many, 
Seven whole days and nights he fasted.
On the first day of his fasting 
Through the leafy woods he wandered; 
Saw the deer start from the thicket, 
Saw the rabbit in his burrow, 
Heard the pheasant, Bena, drumming, 
Heard the squirrel, Adjidaumo, 
Rattling in his hoard of acorns, 
Saw the pigeon, the Omeme, 
Building nests among the pinetrees, 
And in flocks the wild-goose, Wawa, 
Flying to the fen-lands northward, 
Whirring, wailing far above him. 
"Master of Life!" he cried, desponding, 
"Must our lives depend on these things?"
On the next day of his fasting 
By the river's brink he wandered, 
Through the Muskoday, the meadow, 
Saw the wild rice, Mahnomonee, 
Saw the blueberry, Meenahga, 
And the strawberry, Odahmin, 
And the gooseberry, Shahbomin, 
And the grape.vine, the Bemahgut, 
Trailing o'er the alder-branches, 
Filling all the air with fragrance! 
"Master of Life!" he cried, desponding, 
"Must our lives depend on these things?"
On the third day of his fasting 
By the lake he sat and pondered, 
By the still, transparent water; 
Saw the sturgeon, Nahma, leaping, 
Scattering drops like beads of wampum, 
Saw the yellow perch, the Sahwa, 
Like a sunbeam in the water, 
Saw the pike, the Maskenozha, 
And the herring, Okahahwis, 
And the Shawgashee, the crawfish!
"Master of Life!" he cried, desponding, 
"Must our lives depend on these things?"
On the fourth day of his fasting 
In his lodge he lay exhausted; 
From his couch of leaves and branches 
Gazing with half-open eyelids, 
Full of shadowy dreams and visions, 
On the dizzy, swimming landscape, 
On the gleaming of the water, 
On the splendor of the sunset.
And he saw a youth approaching, 
Dressed in garments green and yellow, 
Coming through the purple twilight, 
Through the splendor of the sunset; 
Plumes of green bent o'er his forehead, 
And his hair was soft and golden.
Standing at the open doorway, 
Long he looked at Hiawatha, 
Looked with pity and compassion 
On his wasted form and features, 
And, in accents like the sighing 
Of the South-Wind in the tree-tops, 
Said he, "O my Hiawatha! 
All your prayers are heard in heaven, 
For you pray not like the others; 
Not for greater skill in hunting, 
Not for greater craft in fishing, 
Not for triumph in the battle, 
Nor renown among the warriors, 
But for profit of the people, 
For advantage of the nations.
"From the Master of Life descending, 
I, the friend of man, Mondamin, 
Come to warn you and instruct you, 
How by struggle and by labor 
You shall gain what you have prayed for. 
Rise up from your bed of branches, 
Rise, O youth, and wrestle with me!"
Faint with famine, Hiawatha 
Started from his bed of branches, 
From the twilight of his wigwam 
Forth into the flush of sunset 
Came, and wrestled with Mondamin; 
At his touch he felt new courage 
Throbbing in his brain and bosom, 
Felt new life and hope and vigor 
Run through every nerve and fibre.
So they wrestled there together 
In the glory of the sunset, 
And the more they strove and struggled, 
Stronger still grew Hiawatha; 
Till the darkness fell around them, 
And the heron, the Shuh-shuh-gah, 
From her nest among the pine-trees, 
Gave a cry of lamentation, 
Gave a scream of pain and famine.
"'T Is enough!" then said Mondamin, 
Smiling upon Hiawatha,
"But tomorrow, when the sun sets, 
I will come again to try you." 
And he vanished, and was seen not; 
Whether sinking as the rain sinks, 
Whether rising as the mists rise, 
Hiawatha saw not, knew not, 
Only saw that he had vanished, 
Leaving him alone and fainting, 
With the misty lake below him, 
And the reeling stars above him.
On the morrow and the next day, 
When the sun through heaven descending, 
Like a red and burning cinder 
From the hearth of the Great Spirit, 
Fell into the western waters, 
Came Mondamin for the trial, 
For the strife with Hiawatha; 
Came as silent as the dew comes,
From the empty air appearing, 
Into empty air returning, 
Taking shape when earth it touches, 
But invisible to all men
In its coming and its going.
Thrice they wrestled there together 
In the glory of the sunset, 
Till the darkness fell around them, 
Till the heron, the Shuh-shuh-gah, 
From her nest among the pine-trees, 
Uttered her loud cry of famine, 
And Mondamin paused to listen.
Tall and beautiful he stood there, 
In his garments green and yellow; 
To and fro his plumes above him, 
Waved and nodded with his breathing, 
And the sweat of the encounter 
Stood like drops of dew upon him.
And he cried, "O Hiawatha! 
Bravely have you wrestled with me, 
Thrice have wrestled stoutly with me, 
And the Master of Life, who sees us, 
He will give to you the triumph!"
Then he smiled, and said: "To-morrow 
Is the last day of your conflict,
Is the last day of your fasting. 
You will conquer and o'ercome me; 
Make a bed for me to lie in, 
Where the rain may fall upon me, 
Where the sun may come and warm me; 
Strip these garments, green and yellow, 
Strip this nodding plumage from me, 
Lay me in the earth, and make it 
Soft and loose and light above me.
"Let no hand disturb my slumber, 
Let no weed nor worm molest me, 
Let not Kahgahgee, the raven, 
Come to haunt me and molest me,
Only come yourself to watch me, 
Till I wake, and start, and quicken, 
Till I leap into the sunshine"
And thus saying, he departed; 
Peacefully slept Hiawatha, 
But he heard the Wawonaissa, 
Heard the whippoorwill complaining, 
Perched upon his lonely wigwam; 
Heard the rushing Sebowisha, 
Heard the rivulet rippling near him, 
Talking to the darksome forest; 
Heard the sighing of the branches,
As they lifted and subsided 
At the passing of the night-wind, 
Heard them, as one hears in slumber 
Far-off murmurs, dreamy whispers: 
Peacefully slept Hiawatha.
On the morrow came Nokomis, 
On the seventh day of his fasting, 
Came with food for Hiawatha, 
Came imploring and bewailing, 
Lest his hunger should o'ercome him, 
Lest his fasting should be fatal.
But he tasted not, and touched not, 
Only said to her, "Nokomis, 
Wait until the sun is setting, 
Till the darkness falls around us, 
Till the heron, the Shuh-shuh-gah, 
Crying from the desolate marshes, 
Tells us that the day is ended."
Homeward weeping went Nokomis, 
Sorrowing for her Hiawatha, 
Fearing lest his strength should fail him, 
Lest his fasting should be fatal. 
He meanwhile sat weary waiting 
For the coming of Mondamin, 
Till the shadows, pointing eastward, 
Lengthened over field and forest,
Till the sun dropped from the heaven,
Floating on the waters westward,
As a red leaf in the Autumn
Falls and floats upon the water,
Falls and sinks into its bosom.
And behold! the young Mondamin,
With his soft and shining tresses,
With his garments green and yellow,
With his long and glossy plumage,
Stood and beckoned at the doorway.
And as one in slumber walking,
Pale and haggard, but undaunted,
From the wigwam Hiawatha
Came and wrestled with Mondamin.
Round about him spun the landscape,
Sky and forest reeled together,
And his strong heart leaped within him,
As the sturgeon leaps and struggles
In a net to break its meshes.
Like a ring of fire around him
Blazed and flared the red horizon,
And a hundred suns seemed looking
At the combat of the wrestlers.
Suddenly upon the greensward
All alone stood Hiawatha,
Panting with his wild exertion,
Palpitating with the struggle;
And before him breathless, lifeless,
Lay the youth, with hair dishevelled,
Plumage torn, and garments tattered,
Dead he lay there in the sunset.
And victorious Hiawatha
Made the grave as he commanded,
Stripped the garments from Mondamin,
Stripped his tattered plumage from him,
Laid him in the earth, and made it
Soft and loose and light above him;
And the heron, the Shuh-shuh-gah,
From the melancholy moorlands, 
Gave a cry of lamentation, 
Gave a cry of pain and anguish!
Homeward then went Hiawatha 
To the lodge of old Nokomis, 
And the seven days of his fasting 
Were accomplished and completed. 
But the place was not forgotten 
Where he wrestled with Mondamin; 
Nor forgotten nor neglected 
Was the grave where lay Mondamin, 
Sleeping in the rain and sunshine, 
Where his scattered plumes and garments 
Faded in the rain and sunshine.
Day by day did Hiawatha 
Go to wait and watch beside it;
Kept the dark mould soft above it, 
Kept it clean from weeds and insects, 
Drove away, with scoffs and shoutings, 
Kahgahgee, the king of ravens.
Till at length a small green feather 
From the earth shot slowly upward, 
Then another and another, 
And before the Summer ended 
Stood the maize in all its beauty, 
With its shining robes about it, 
And its long, soft, yellow tresses; 
And in rapture Hiawatha 
Cried aloud, "It is Mondamin! 
Yes, the friend of man, Mondamin!"
Then he called to old Nokomis 
And Iagoo, the great boaster, 
Showed them where the maize was growing, 
Told them of his wondrous vision, 
Of his wrestling and his triumph, 
Of this new gift to the nations, 
Which should be their food forever.
And still later, when the Autumn 
Changed the long, green leaves to yellow, 
And the soft and juicy kernels 
Grew like wampum hard and yellow, 
Then the ripened ears he gathered, 
Stripped the withered husks from off them, 
As he once had stripped the wrestler, 
Gave the first Feast of Mondamin, 
And made known unto the people 
This new gift of the Great Spirit.
Written by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow | Create an image from this poem

Voices Of the Night

 PRELUDE.

Pleasant it was, when woods were green,
And winds were soft and low,
To lie amid some sylvan scene,
Where, the long drooping boughs between
Shadows dark and sunlight sheen
Alternate come and go;

Or where the denser grove receives
No sunlight from above
But the dark foliage interweaves
In one unbroken roof of leaves,
Underneath whose sloping eaves
The shadows hardly move.

Beneath some patriarchal tree
I lay upon the ground;
His hoary arms uplifted he,
And all the broad leaves over me
Clapped their little hands in glee,
With one continuous sound;-

A slumberous sound,-a sound that brings
The feelings of a dream,-
As of innumerable wings,
As, when a bell no longer swings,
Faint the hollow murmur rings
O'er meadow, lake, and stream.

And dreams of that which cannot die,
Bright visins, came to me,
As lapped in thought I used to lie,
And gaze into the summer sky,
Where the sailing clouds went by,
Like ships upon the sea;

Dreams that the soul of youth engage
Ere Fancy has been quelled;
Old legends of the monkish page.
Traditions of the saint and sage,
Tales that have the rime of age,
And chronicles of Eld.

And, loving still these quaint old themes,
Even in the city's throng
I feel the freshness of the streams,
That, crossed by shades and sunny gleams,
Water the green land of dreams,
The holy land of song.

Therefore, at Pentecost, which brings
The Spring, clothed like a bride,
When nestling buds unfold their wings,
And bishop's-caps have golden rings,
Musing upon many things,
I sought the woodlands wide.

The green trees whispered low and mild,
It was a sound of joy!
They were my playmates when a child
And rocked me in their arms so wild!
Still they looked at me and smiled
As if I were a boy;

And ever whispered, mild and low,
"Come, be a child once more!"
And waved their long arms to and fro,
And beckoned solemnly and slow;
O, I could not choose but go
Into the woodlands hoar;

Into the blithe and breathing air,
Into the solemn wood.
Solemn and silent everywhere!
Nature with folded hands seemed there,
Kneeling at her evening prayer!
Like one in prayer I stood.

Before me rose an avenue
Of tall and sombrous pines;
Abroad their fan-like branches grew,
And, where the sunshine darted throught
Spread a vapor soft and blue,
In long and sloping lines.

And, falling on my weary brain,
Like a fast-falling shower,
The dreams of youth came back again,
Low lispings of the summer rain,
Dropping on the ripened grain,
As once upon the flower.

Visions of childhood! Stay, O stay!
Ye were so sweet and wild!
And distant voices seemed to say,
"It cannot be! They pass away!
Other themes demand thy lay;
Thou art no more a child!

"The land of Song within thee lies,
Watered by living springs;
The lids of Fancy's sleepless eyes
Are gates unto that Paradise;
Holy thoughts, like stars, arise,
Its clouds are angels' wings.

"Learn, that henceforth thy song shall be
Not mountains capped with snow,
Nor forests sounding like the sea,
Nor rivers flowing ceaselessly,
Where the woodlands bend to see
The bending heavens below.

"There is a forest where the din
Of iron branches sounds!
A mighty river roara between,
And whosoever looks therein,
Sees the heavens all black with sin,-
Sees not ita depths, nor bounds.

"Athwart the swinging branches cast,
Soft rays of sunshine pour;
Then comes the fearful wintry blast;
Our hopes, like withered leaves, fall fast;
Pallid lips say, 'It is past!
We can return no more!'

"Look, then, into thine heart, and write!
Yes, into Life's deep stream!
All forms of sorrow and delight,
All solemn Voices of the Night,
That can soothe thee, or affright,-
Be these henceforth thy theme."
Written by Alan Seeger | Create an image from this poem

Fragments

 In that fair capital where Pleasure, crowned 
Amidst her myriad courtiers, riots and rules, 
I too have been a suitor. Radiant eyes 
Were my life's warmth and sunshine, outspread arms 
My gilded deep horizons. I rejoiced 
In yielding to all amorous influence 
And multiple impulsion of the flesh, 
To feel within my being surge and sway 
The force that all the stars acknowledge too. 
Amid the nebulous humanity 
Where I an atom crawled and cleaved and sundered, 
I saw a million motions, but one law; 
And from the city's splendor to my eyes 
The vapors passed and there was nought but Love, 
A ferment turbulent, intensely fair, 
Where Beauty beckoned and where Strength pursued. 

II 


There was a time when I thought much of Fame, 
And laid the golden edifice to be 
That in the clear light of eternity 
Should fitly house the glory of my name. 


But swifter than my fingers pushed their plan, 
Over the fair foundation scarce begun, 
While I with lovers dallied in the sun, 
The ivy clambered and the rose-vine ran. 


And now, too late to see my vision, rise, 
In place of golden pinnacles and towers, 
Only some sunny mounds of leaves and flowers, 
Only beloved of birds and butterflies. 


My friends were duped, my favorers deceived; 
But sometimes, musing sorrowfully there, 
That flowered wreck has seemed to me so fair 
I scarce regret the temple unachieved. 

III 


For there were nights . . . my love to him whose brow 
Has glistened with the spoils of nights like those, 
Home turning as a conqueror turns home, 
What time green dawn down every street uprears 
Arches of triumph! He has drained as well 
Joy's perfumed bowl and cried as I have cried: 
Be Fame their mistress whom Love passes by. 
This only matters: from some flowery bed, 
Laden with sweetness like a homing bee, 
If one have known what bliss it is to come, 
Bearing on hands and breast and laughing lips 
The fragrance of his youth's dear rose. To him 
The hills have bared their treasure, the far clouds 
Unveiled the vision that o'er summer seas 
Drew on his thirsting arms. This last thing known, 
He can court danger, laugh at perilous odds, 
And, pillowed on a memory so sweet, 
Unto oblivious eternity 
Without regret yield his victorious soul, 
The blessed pilgrim of a vow fulfilled. 

IV 


What is Success? Out of the endless ore 
Of deep desire to coin the utmost gold 
Of passionate memory; to have lived so well 
That the fifth moon, when it swims up once more 
Through orchard boughs where mating orioles build 
And apple flowers unfold, 
Find not of that dear need that all things tell 
The heart unburdened nor the arms unfilled. 


O Love, whereof my boyhood was the dream, 
My youth the beautiful novitiate, 
Life was so slight a thing and thou so great, 
How could I make thee less than all-supreme! 
In thy sweet transports not alone I thought 
Mingled the twain that panted breast to breast. 
The sun and stars throbbed with them; they were caught 
Into the pulse of Nature and possessed 
By the same light that consecrates it so. 
Love! -- 'tis the payment of the debt we owe 
The beauty of the world, and whensoe'er 
In silks and perfume and unloosened hair 
The loveliness of lovers, face to face, 
Lies folded in the adorable embrace, 
Doubt not as of a perfect sacrifice 
That soul partakes whose inspiration fills 
The springtime and the depth of summer skies, 
The rainbow and the clouds behind the hills, 
That excellence in earth and air and sea 
That makes things as they are the real divinity.
Written by Alan Seeger | Create an image from this poem

Juvenilia An Ode to Natural Beauty

 There is a power whose inspiration fills 
Nature's fair fabric, sun- and star-inwrought, 
Like airy dew ere any drop distils, 
Like perfume in the laden flower, like aught 
Unseen which interfused throughout the whole 
Becomes its quickening pulse and principle and soul. 
Now when, the drift of old desire renewing, 
Warm tides flow northward over valley and field, 
When half-forgotten sound and scent are wooing 
From their deep-chambered recesses long sealed 
Such memories as breathe once more 
Of childhood and the happy hues it wore, 
Now, with a fervor that has never been 
In years gone by, it stirs me to respond, -- 
Not as a force whose fountains are within 
The faculties of the percipient mind, 
Subject with them to darkness and decay, 
But something absolute, something beyond, 
Oft met like tender orbs that seem to peer 
From pale horizons, luminous behind 
Some fringe of tinted cloud at close of day; 
And in this flood of the reviving year, 
When to the loiterer by sylvan streams, 
Deep in those cares that make Youth loveliest, 
Nature in every common aspect seems 
To comment on the burden in his breast -- 
The joys he covets and the dreams he dreams -- 
One then with all beneath the radiant skies 
That laughs with him or sighs, 
It courses through the lilac-scented air, 
A blessing on the fields, a wonder everywhere. 


Spirit of Beauty, whose sweet impulses, 
Flung like the rose of dawn across the sea, 
Alone can flush the exalted consciousness 
With shafts of sensible divinity -- 
Light of the World, essential loveliness: 
Him whom the Muse hath made thy votary 
Not from her paths and gentle precepture 
Shall vulgar ends engage, nor break the spell 
That taught him first to feel thy secret charms 
And o'er the earth, obedient to their lure, 
Their sweet surprise and endless miracle, 
To follow ever with insatiate arms. 
On summer afternoons, 
When from the blue horizon to the shore, 
Casting faint silver pathways like the moon's 
Across the Ocean's glassy, mottled floor, 
Far clouds uprear their gleaming battlements 
Drawn to the crest of some bleak eminence, 
When autumn twilight fades on the sere hill 
And autumn winds are still; 
To watch the East for some emerging sign, 
Wintry Capella or the Pleiades 
Or that great huntsman with the golden gear; 
Ravished in hours like these 
Before thy universal shrine 
To feel the invoked presence hovering near, 
He stands enthusiastic. Star-lit hours 
Spent on the roads of wandering solitude 
Have set their sober impress on his brow, 
And he, with harmonies of wind and wood 
And torrent and the tread of mountain showers, 
Has mingled many a dedicative vow 
That holds him, till thy last delight be known, 
Bound in thy service and in thine alone. 


I, too, among the visionary throng 
Who choose to follow where thy pathway leads, 
Have sold my patrimony for a song, 
And donned the simple, lowly pilgrim's weeds. 
From that first image of beloved walls, 
Deep-bowered in umbrage of ancestral trees, 
Where earliest thy sweet enchantment falls, 
Tingeing a child's fantastic reveries 
With radiance so fair it seems to be 
Of heavens just lost the lingering evidence 
From that first dawn of roseate infancy, 
So long beneath thy tender influence 
My breast has thrilled. As oft for one brief second 
The veil through which those infinite offers beckoned 
Has seemed to tremble, letting through 
Some swift intolerable view 
Of vistas past the sense of mortal seeing, 
So oft, as one whose stricken eyes might see 
In ferny dells the rustic deity, 
I stood, like him, possessed, and all my being, 
Flooded an instant with unwonted light, 
Quivered with cosmic passion; whether then 
On woody pass or glistening mountain-height 
I walked in fellowship with winds and clouds, 
Whether in cities and the throngs of men, 
A curious saunterer through friendly crowds, 
Enamored of the glance in passing eyes, 
Unuttered salutations, mute replies, -- 
In every character where light of thine 
Has shed on earthly things the hue of things divine 
I sought eternal Loveliness, and seeking, 
If ever transport crossed my brow bespeaking 
Such fire as a prophetic heart might feel 
Where simple worship blends in fervent zeal, 
It was the faith that only love of thee 
Needed in human hearts for Earth to see 
Surpassed the vision poets have held dear 
Of joy diffused in most communion here; 
That whomsoe'er thy visitations warmed, 
Lover of thee in all thy rays informed, 
Needed no difficulter discipline 
To seek his right to happiness within 
Than, sensible of Nature's loveliness, 
To yield him to the generous impulses 
By such a sentiment evoked. The thought, 
Bright Spirit, whose illuminings I sought, 
That thou unto thy worshipper might be 
An all-sufficient law, abode with me, 
Importing something more than unsubstantial dreams 
To vigils by lone shores and walks by murmuring streams. 


Youth's flowers like childhood's fade and are forgot. 
Fame twines a tardy crown of yellowing leaves. 
How swift were disillusion, were it not 
That thou art steadfast where all else deceives! 
Solace and Inspiration, Power divine 
That by some mystic sympathy of thine, 
When least it waits and most hath need of thee, 
Can startle the dull spirit suddenly 
With grandeur welled from unsuspected springs, -- 
Long as the light of fulgent evenings, 
When from warm showers the pearly shades disband 
And sunset opens o'er the humid land, 
Shows thy veiled immanence in orient skies, -- 
Long as pale mist and opalescent dyes 
Hung on far isle or vanishing mountain-crest, 
Fields of remote enchantment can suggest 
So sweet to wander in it matters nought, 
They hold no place but in impassioned thought, 
Long as one draught from a clear sky may be 
A scented luxury; 
Be thou my worship, thou my sole desire, 
Thy paths my pilgrimage, my sense a lyre 
Aeolian for thine every breath to stir; 
Oft when her full-blown periods recur, 
To see the birth of day's transparent moon 
Far from cramped walls may fading afternoon 
Find me expectant on some rising lawn; 
Often depressed in dewy grass at dawn, 
Me, from sweet slumber underneath green boughs, 
Ere the stars flee may forest matins rouse, 
Afoot when the great sun in amber floods 
Pours horizontal through the steaming woods 
And windless fumes from early chimneys start 
And many a cock-crow cheers the traveller's heart 
Eager for aught the coming day afford 
In hills untopped and valleys unexplored. 
Give me the white road into the world's ends, 
Lover of roadside hazard, roadside friends, 
Loiterer oft by upland farms to gaze 
On ample prospects, lost in glimmering haze 
At noon, or where down odorous dales twilit, 
Filled with low thundering of the mountain stream, 
Over the plain where blue seas border it 
The torrid coast-towns gleam. 


I have fared too far to turn back now; my breast 
Burns with the lust for splendors unrevealed, 
Stars of midsummer, clouds out of the west, 
Pallid horizons, winds that valley and field 
Laden with joy, be ye my refuge still! 
What though distress and poverty assail! 
Though other voices chide, yours never will. 
The grace of a blue sky can never fail. 
Powers that my childhood with a spell so sweet, 
My youth with visions of such glory nursed, 
Ye have beheld, nor ever seen my feet 
On any venture set, but 'twas the thirst 
For Beauty willed them, yea, whatever be 
The faults I wanted wings to rise above; 
I am cheered yet to think how steadfastly 
I have been loyal to the love of Love!
Written by Edwin Arlington Robinson | Create an image from this poem

The Town Down by the River

 I

Said the Watcher by the Way 
To the young and the unladen, 
To the boy and to the maiden, 
"God be with you both to-day. 
First your song came ringing, 
Now you come, you two-- 
Knowing naught of what you do, 
Or of what your dreams are bringing.

"O you children who go singing 
To the Town down the River, 
Where the millions cringe and shiver, 
Tell me what you know to-day; 
Tell me how far you are going, 
Tell me how you find your way. 
O you children who are dreaming, 
Tell me what you dream to-day."

"He is old and we have heard him," 
Said the boy then to the maiden; 
"He is old and heavy laden 
With a load we throw away. 
Care may come to find us, 
Age may lay us low; 
Still, we seek the light we know, 
And the dead we leave behind us.

"Did he think that he would blind us 
Into such a small believing 
As to live without achieving, 
When the lights have led so far? 
Let him watch or let him wither,-- 
Shall he tell us where we are? 
We know best, who go together, 
Downward, onward, and so far."

II

Said the Watcher by the Way 
To the fiery folk that hastened 
To the loud and the unchastened, 
"You are strong, I see, to-day. 
Strength and hope may lead you 
To the journey's end,-- 
Each to be the other's friend 
If the Town should fail to need you.

"And are ravens there to feed you 
In the Town down the River, 
Where the gift appalls the giver 
And youth hardens day by day? 
O you brave and you unshaken, 
Are you truly on your way? 
And are sirens in the River, 
That you come so far to-day?"

"You are old and we have listened," 
Said the voice of one who halted; 
"You are sage and self-exalted, 
But your way is not our way. 
You that cannot aid us 
Give us words to eat. 
Be assured that they are sweet, 
And that we are as God made us.

"Not in vain have you delayed us, 
Though the river still be calling 
Through the twilight that is falling 
And the Town be still so far. 
By the whirlwind of your wisdom 
Leagues are lifted as leaves are; 
But a king without a kingdom 
Fails us, who have come so far."

III

Said the Watcher by the Way 
To the slower folk who stumbled, 
To the weak and the world-humbled, 
"Tell me how you fare to-day. 
Some with ardor shaken, 
All with honor scarred, 
Do you falter, finding hard 
The far chance that you have taken?

"Or, do you at length awaken 
To an antic retribution, 
Goading to a new confusion 
The drugged hopes of yesterday? 
O you poor mad men that hobble, 
Will you not return or stay? 
Do you trust, you broken people, 
To a dawn without the day?"

"You speak well of what you know not," 
Muttered one; and then a second: 
"You have begged, and you have beckoned, 
But you see us on our way. 
Who are you to scold us, 
Knowing what we know? 
Jeremiah, long ago, 
Said as much as you have told us.

"As we are, then, you behold us: 
Derelicts of all conditions, 
Poets, rogues, and sick physicians, 
Plodding forward from afar; 
Forward now into the darkness 
Where the men before us are; 
Forward, onward, out of grayness, 
To the light that shone so far."

IV

Said the Watcher by the Way 
To some aged ones who lingered, 
To the shrunken, the claw-fingered, 
"So you come for me to-day."-- 
"Yes, to give you warning; 
You are old," one said; 
"You have hairs on your head, 
Fit for laurel, not for scorning.

"From the first of early morning 
We have toiled along to find you; 
We, as others, have maligned you, 
But we need your scorn to-day. 
By the light that we saw shining, 
Let us not be lured alway; 
Let us hear no River calling 
When to-morrow is to-day."

"But your lanterns are unlighted 
And the Town is far before you: 
Let us hasten, I implore you," 
Said the Watcher by the Way. 
"Long have I waited, 
Longer have I known 
That the Town would have its own, 
And the call be for the fated.

"In the name of all created. 
Let us hear no more my brothers; 
Are we older than all others? 
Are the planets in our way?"-- 
"Hark," said one; I hear the River, 
Calling always, night and day."-- 
"Forward, then! The lights are shining," 
Said the Watcher by the Way.

Book: Reflection on the Important Things