Classic Poem

There at the factory I like to see
The porcelain workers bending busily
To turn the pliant clay on restless wheels,
Till jug or plate at length its form reveals.

More than wrought silver do you win my praise,
You jug but destined for a plain white glaze.
More than a vessel made for some rich lord
I reverence you, plate for a meagre board.

You I respect, O unpretentious mould,
That shortly, reproduced a thousand-fold,
Will pass in artisan's or peasant's nest,
When labor takes a scanty meal-time rest.

I 'm sick of all the useless gaudy wares,
For whose vain beauty no one really cares;
But hail the hand whose cunning is bestowed
On weary workers in a mean abode!

Yes, hail the unknown hand, and hail to him
That formed the homely beaker, to whose brim
A warm and thirsty mouth in haste will glide,
When the worn tools are laid an hour aside!

The hand whose work we pass and never see
Is far more indispensable than we,
Mere bubble-blowers of high-sounding words
At play by culture's overladen boards.

Ah, that a man might mould a poem so,
Of simple words that every one should know,
Might shape a form for offering daily bread
To hungry folk, not to the overfed!

Ah, would that I might make, on such a plan,
A cup to suit the mouth of every man,
Which, brimming from the well of Time, might long
Give drink to thousands thirsting after song!