Written by
Robert Frost |
There were three in the meadow by the brook
Gathering up windrows, piling cocks of hay,
With an eye always lifted toward the west
Where an irregular sun-bordered cloud
Darkly advanced with a perpetual dagger
Flickering across its bosom. Suddenly
One helper, thrusting pitchfork in the ground,
Marched himself off the field and home. One stayed.
The town-bred farmer failed to understand.
"What is there wrong?"
"Something you just now said."
"What did I say?"
"About our taking pains."
"To cock the hay?--because it's going to shower?
I said that more than half an hour ago.
I said it to myself as much as you."
"You didn't know. But James is one big fool.
He thought you meant to find fault with his work.
That's what the average farmer would have meant.
James would take time, of course, to chew it over
Before he acted: he's just got round to act."
"He is a fool if that's the way he takes me."
"Don't let it bother you. You've found out something.
The hand that knows his business won't be told
To do work better or faster--those two things.
I'm as particular as anyone:
Most likely I'd have served you just the same.
But I know you don't understand our ways.
You were just talking what was in your mind,
What was in all our minds, and you weren't hinting.
Tell you a story of what happened once:
I was up here in Salem at a man's
Named Sanders with a gang of four or five
Doing the haying. No one liked the boss.
He was one of the kind sports call a spider,
All wiry arms and legs that spread out wavy
From a humped body nigh as big's a biscuit.
But work! that man could work, especially
If by so doing he could get more work
Out of his hired help. I'm not denying
He was hard on himself. I couldn't find
That he kept any hours--not for himself.
Daylight and lantern-light were one to him:
I've heard him pounding in the barn all night.
But what he liked was someone to encourage.
Them that he couldn't lead he'd get behind
And drive, the way you can, you know, in mowing--
Keep at their heels and threaten to mow their legs off.
I'd seen about enough of his bulling tricks
(We call that bulling). I'd been watching him.
So when he paired off with me in the hayfield
To load the load, thinks I, Look out for trouble.
I built the load and topped it off; old Sanders
Combed it down with a rake and says, 'O. K.'
Everything went well till we reached the barn
With a big catch to empty in a bay.
You understand that meant the easy job
For the man up on top of throwing down
The hay and rolling it off wholesale,
Where on a mow it would have been slow lifting.
You wouldn't think a fellow'd need much urging
Under these circumstances, would you now?
But the old fool seizes his fork in both hands,
And looking up bewhiskered out of the pit,
Shouts like an army captain, 'Let her come!'
Thinks I, D'ye mean it? 'What was that you said?'
I asked out loud, so's there'd be no mistake,
'Did you say, Let her come?' 'Yes, let her come.'
He said it over, but he said it softer.
Never you say a thing like that to a man,
Not if he values what he is. God, I'd as soon
Murdered him as left out his middle name.
I'd built the load and knew right where to find it.
Two or three forkfuls I picked lightly round for
Like meditating, and then I just dug in
And dumped the rackful on him in ten lots.
I looked over the side once in the dust
And caught sight of him treading-water-like,
Keeping his head above. 'Damn ye,' I says,
'That gets ye!' He squeaked like a squeezed rat.
That was the last I saw or heard of him.
I cleaned the rack and drove out to cool off.
As I sat mopping hayseed from my neck,
And sort of waiting to be asked about it,
One of the boys sings out, 'Where's the old man?'
'I left him in the barn under the hay.
If ye want him, ye can go and dig him out.'
They realized from the way I swobbed my neck
More than was needed something must be up.
They headed for the barn; I stayed where I was.
They told me afterward. First they forked hay,
A lot of it, out into the barn floor.
Nothing! They listened for him. Not a rustle.
I guess they thought I'd spiked him in the temple
Before I buried him, or I couldn't have managed.
They excavated more. 'Go keep his wife
Out of the barn.' Someone looked in a window,
And curse me if he wasn't in the kitchen
Slumped way down in a chair, with both his feet
Stuck in the oven, the hottest day that summer.
He looked so clean disgusted from behind
There was no one that dared to stir him up,
Or let him know that he was being looked at.
Apparently I hadn't buried him
(I may have knocked him down); but my just trying
To bury him had hurt his dignity.
He had gone to the house so's not to meet me.
He kept away from us all afternoon.
We tended to his hay. We saw him out
After a while picking peas in his garden:
He couldn't keep away from doing something."
"Weren't you relieved to find he wasn't dead?"
"No! and yet I don't know--it's hard to say.
I went about to kill him fair enough."
"You took an awkward way. Did he discharge you?"
"Discharge me? No! He knew I did just right."
|
Written by
William Butler Yeats |
I have met them at close of day
Coming with vivid faces
From counter or desk among grey
Eighteenth-century houses.
I have passed with a nod of the head
Or polite meaningless words,
Or have lingered awhile and said
Polite meaningless words,
And thought before I had done
Of a mocking tale or a gibe
To please a companion
Around the fire at the club,
Being certain that they and I
But lived where motley is worn:
All changed, changed utterly:
A terrible beauty is born.
That woman's days were spent
In ignorant good-will,
Her nights in argument
Until her voice grew shrill.
What voice more sweet than hers
When, young and beautiful,
She rode to harriers?
This man had kept a school
And rode our winged horse;
This other his helper and friend
Was coming into his force;
He might have won fame in the end,
So sensitive his nature seemed,
So daring and sweet his thought.
This other man I had dreamed
A drunken, vainglorious lout.
He had done most bitter wrong
To some who are near my heart,
Yet I number him in the song;
He, too, has resigned his part
In the casual comedy;
He, too, has been changed in his turn,
Transformed utterly:
A terrible beauty is born.
Hearts with one purpose alone
Through summer and winter seem
Enchanted to a stone
To trouble the living stream.
The horse that comes from the road.
The rider, the birds that range
From cloud to tumbling cloud,
Minute by minute they change;
A shadow of cloud on the stream
Changes minute by minute;
A horse-hoof slides on the brim,
And a horse plashes within it;
The long-legged moor-hens dive,
And hens to moor-cocks call;
Minute by minute they live:
The stone's in the midst of all.
Too long a sacrifice
Can make a stone of the heart.
O when may it suffice?
That is Heaven's part, our part
To murmur name upon name,
As a mother names her child
When sleep at last has come
On limbs that had run wild.
What is it but nightfall?
No, no, not night but death;
Was it needless death after all?
For England may keep faith
For all that is done and said.
We know their dream; enough
To know they dreamed and are dead;
And what if excess of love
Bewildered them till they died?
I write it out in a verse -
MacDonagh and MacBride
And Connolly and pearse
Now and in time to be,
Wherever green is worn,
Are changed, changed utterly:
A terrible beauty is born.
|
Written by
Margaret Widdemer |
Well, if the thing is over, better it is for me,
The lad was ever a rover, loving and laughing free,
Far too clever a lover not to be having still
A lass in the town and a lass by the road and a lass by the farther hill --
Love on the field and love on the path and love in the woody glen --
(Lad, will I never see you, never your face again?)
Ay, if the thing is ending, now I'll be getting rest,
Saying my prayers and bending down to be stilled and blest,
Never the days are sending hope till my heart is sore
For a laugh on the path and a voice by the gate and a step
on the shieling floor --
Grief on my ways and grief on my work and grief till the evening's dim --
(Lord, will I never hear it, never a sound of him?)
Sure if it's done forever, better for me that's wise,
Never the hurt, and never tears in my aching eyes,
No more the trouble ever to hide from my asking folk
Beat of my heart at click o' the latch, and throb if his name is spoke;
Never the need to hide the sighs and the flushing thoughts and the fret,
And after awhile my heart will hush and my hungering hands forget . . .
Peace on my ways, and peace in my step, and maybe my heart grown light --
(Mary, helper of heartbreak, send him to me to-night!)
|
Written by
Isaac Watts |
v.6-15
C. M.
Deliverance from a tumult.
The Lord appears my helper now,
Nor is my faith afraid
What all the sons of earth can do,
Since heav'n affords its aid.
'Tis safer, Lord, to hope in thee,
And have my God my friend,
Than trust in men of high degree,
And on their truth depend.
Like bees, my foes beset me round,
A large and angry swarm;
But I shall all their rage confound
By thine almighty arm.
'Tis through the Lord my heart is strong,
In him my lips rejoice;
While his salvation is my song,
How cheerful is my voice!
Like angry bees, they girt me round;
When God appears they fly;
So burning thorns, with crackling sound,
Make a fierce blaze and die.
Joy to the saints and peace belongs;
The Lord protects their days:
Let Isr'el tune immortal songs
To his almighty grace.
|
Written by
James Stephens |
I am the maker,
The builder, the breaker,
The eagle-winged helper,
The speedy forsaker!
The lance and the lyre,
The water, the fire,
The tooth of oppression,
The lip of desire!
The snare and the wing,
They honey, the sting!
When you seek for me--look
For a different thing!
I, careless and gay,
Never mean what I say,
For my thoughts and my eyes
Look the opposite way!
|
Written by
Isaac Watts |
v.1-16
C. M.
The sufferings and death of Christ.
Why has my God my soul forsook,
Nor will a smile afford?
(Thus David once in anguish spoke,
And thus our dying Lord.)
Though 'tis thy chief delight to dwell
Among thy praising saints,
Yet thou canst hear a groan as well,
And pity our complaints.
Our fathers trusted in thy name,
And great deliv'rance found;
But I'm a worm, despised of men,
And trodden to the ground.
Shaking the head, they pass me by,
And laugh my soul to scorn;
"In vain he trusts in God," they cry,.
"Neglected and forlorn."
But thou art he who formed my flesh
By thine almighty word;
And since I hung upon the breast,
My hope is in the Lord.
Why will my Father hide his face,
When foes stand threat'ning round,
In the dark hour of deep distress,
And not a helper found?
PAUSE.
Behold thy darling left among
The cruel and the proud,
As bulls of Bashan, fierce and strong,
As lions roaring loud.
From earth and hell my sorrows meet
To multiply the smart;
They nail my hands, they pierce my feet,
And try to vex my heart.
Yet if thy sovereign hand let loose
The rage of earth and hell,
Why will my heav'nly Father bruise
The Son he loves so well?
My God, if possible it be,
Withhold this bitter cup
But I resign my will to thee,
And drink the sorrows up).
My heart dissolves with pangs unknown,
In groans I waste my breath;
Thy heavy hand has brought me down
Low as the dust of death.
Father, I give my spirit up,
And trust it in thy hand;
My dying flesh shall rest in hope,
And rise at thy command.
|
Written by
Isaac Watts |
v.1,2
C. M.
Assistance and victory in the spiritual warfare.
For ever blessed be the Lord,
My Savior and my shield;
He sends his Spirit with his word,
To arm me for the field.
When sin and hell their force unite,
He makes my soul his care,
Instructs me to the heav'nly fight,
And guards me through the war.
A friend and helper so divine
Does my weak courage raise;
He makes the glorious vict'ry mine,
And his shall be the praise.
|
Written by
Isaac Watts |
Death of kindred improved.
Zech. 1:5.
Must friends and kindred droop and die,
And helpers be withdrawn?
While sorrow with a weeping eye
Counts up our comforts gone?
Be thou our comfort, mighty God!
Our helper and our friend;
Nor leave us in this dangerous road,
Till all our trials end.
O may our feet pursue the way
Our pious fathers led!
With love and holy zeal obey
The counsels of the dead.
Let us be weaned from all below,
Let hope our grief expel,
While death invites our souls to go
Where our best kindred dwell.
|
Written by
John McCrae |
". . . defeated, with great loss."
Not we the conquered! Not to us the blame
Of them that flee, of them that basely yield;
Nor ours the shout of victory, the fame
Of them that vanquish in a stricken field.
That day of battle in the dusty heat
We lay and heard the bullets swish and sing
Like scythes amid the over-ripened wheat,
And we the harvest of their garnering.
Some yielded, No, not we! Not we, we swear
By these our wounds; this trench upon the hill
Where all the shell-strewn earth is seamed and bare,
Was ours to keep; and lo! we have it still.
We might have yielded, even we, but death
Came for our helper; like a sudden flood
The crashing darkness fell; our painful breath
We drew with gasps amid the choking blood.
The roar fell faint and farther off, and soon
Sank to a foolish humming in our ears,
Like crickets in the long, hot afternoon
Among the wheat fields of the olden years.
Before our eyes a boundless wall of red
Shot through by sudden streaks of jagged pain!
Then a slow-gathering darkness overhead
And rest came on us like a quiet rain.
Not we the conquered! Not to us the shame,
Who hold our earthen ramparts, nor shall cease
To hold them ever; victors we, who came
In that fierce moment to our honoured peace.
|
Written by
Anonymous |
Thine eye is on me always,Thou knowest the way I take;Thou seest me when I’m sleeping,Thou seest me when I wake.Thine arm is round about me,Thy hand is underneath;Thy love will still preserve me,If I Thy laws do keep.Thou art my present helper,—Be Thou my daily guide;[Pg 009]Then I’ll be safe for ever,Whatever may betide.Oh! help me, dearest Father,To walk in wisdom’s way,That I, Thy loving child, may beThrough every future day,And, by my loving actions, proveThat He who guardeth me is Love.
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