Life will finish the work you are doing.
You are only one who has joined the workers
In the morning, at noon or toward shadows.
Countless have toiled before you,
There will be countless toiling after.

The crowds in the street move faster and faster,
Their eyes are on invisible clocks that speed the hours,
They move fast and faster, they must know soon. . . .

There is a cause and they are comrades. . . .

This is the word to come where men will look for truth.
On every one of the streets of all the cities

My love's a rose,
A perfect flower.
Her beauty grows
With every hour.

And when she smiles,
A fragrance rare
My heart beguiles
With visions fair.

And when she pouts
At me forlorn,
I have no doubts
About the thorn!

The sun and all the stars shine on thy head,
The grass and blossoms all are at thy feet;
Nature's glad pageantries for thee are spread,
Her winds loosed for thee, seminal and sweet;
For thee young morn binds his bright sandals on;
Pale evening leads thee to the mother-fold;
The patient seasons serve thee: none are gone
Of all the glories thronging from of old.
Hoar silence sings thee her primeval lay;
Apt dream wraps round thee her enchanting light;
August companions walk with thee by day,
They share thy bed in darkness of the night:

John sawr-O, John sawr-O…
John saw de holy number settin' on de golden altar!

It's a little while longer yere below, yere below, yere below,
It's a little while longer yere below, Before de Lamb of God!

And home to Jesus we will go, we will go, etc.;
We are de people of de Lord.
John sawr-O, etc.

Dere's a golden slipper in de heavens for you, etc.,
Before de Lamb of God.

I wish I'd been dere when prayer begun, etc.

To see my Jesus about my sins, etc.

Then home to glory we will go, etc.

Family treasures
Tarnish in the wicker trunk
I carry on board.

Only the footprints of the partridge run
Over the billowy drifts of the mountain-side;
And now on level wings the brown birds glide,
Following the snowy curves, and in the sun
Bright birds of gold above the stainless white
They move, and as their pale blue shadows move,
With them my heart glides on in golden flight
Over the hills of quiet to my love.

Storm-shaken, racked with terror through the long
Tempestuous night, in the quiet blue of morn
Love drinks the crystal airs, and peace newborn
Within his troubled heart, on wings aglow

Sheathed in scales of silver sequins,
In a blue pool of limelight dancing,
She twists and twirls and smiles and beckons
With dark eyes glancing—

She beckons to me in my skyey seat
With smiling teeth and dark eyes glancing:
But I only see as I watch her dancing
The shadows that seek to tangle her feet.

To-day my children came to me:
“Sidney Drew's dead!”
They said.

I hope that Sidney Drew can see,
Even from far eternity
Beyond these pallid April skies,
The tribute of my children's eyes.

Dirty little smudged face, and bare and battéred feet,
Playing in the sunshine, laughing at the heat,
Light of heart and care-free, down on Bleecker Street.

Wonder what you think, boy, wonder do you dream—
Summer in the country, and field, and wood, and stream,
Wind among the roses, and stars that glow and gleam?
Wonder if the message that makes the summer dear,
Song that thrills my heart-strings murmurs in your ear;
If it came a-wooing, I wonder would you hear?

If it came a-wooing,—Ah, God is kind and wise,
Would not wake the hunger in a baby's eyes,

Far in a wide and silent forest's shade,
Upon a thick and fragrant bed of moss,
Whose thousand tiny, sweet and tangled flowers
Were stained with blood, that from its wounded breast
Did ebb away, a gentle faun did lie;
And from its quivering lips and panting side,
Its short and painful breath came gasping forth,
Blowing sweet incense soft upon the palm
Of a young lad, who, in his tender hand,
Bore up upon his lap its drooping head,—
The author and the pitier of its plight.
For 'twas that hand that but a space before