Classic Poem

In mount or vale, throughout the changeful year,
From all the by-ways of the world, I peer
Into the secret places where they wind
Almost beyond the utmost reach of mind,
And beauty, beauty everywhere I find.

" O why, " I asked, " doth Nature in such wealth
Lavish her jewels, hide them as by stealth,
The wondrous treasures of her artist soul
In opulence outpour, and o'er the whole
Great wilderness of worlds her splendours roll? "

From jungles only to the wild things known,
From waste karroo, from forest deep and lone.
From icy north, and from each starry flame
That looks into the ocean's mirror-frame,
One clear and universal answer came:

" The Soul of All is beautiful; then why
Should Nature anywhere in earth or sky
Fall from her high estate? If it should be
One wild flamingo by an unknown sea
Found God unbeautiful, no God were He! "

Eternal Beauty will have all things under
His own majestic form;
He shapes their plastic souls to dreams of wonder
With sledges of the storm,
In fires of life, on anvils of the thunder,
His Love the changeless norm.

So Life is making beautiful and tender
All spirits that aspire,
Conformed by faith and hope, however slender,
To Love's supreme desire;
He makes the children of the gleam a splendour
In His refining fire.

The mother of a great love-consummation
In some low manger lies;
Lo, all the prophets of illumination
Have heard her travail-cries.
Joy to the world when for its full salvation
A Christed nation dies!

The peaks of life have deep and dark foundation
And strong granitic sills
That feel the hammer-stroke and take formation
And fashion as Love wills,
That all the tribes may build their habitation
Upon His purple hills.

And ever when the breezes soft are singing
Where pines the forest gird.
They tell the anguish that Love's soul is wringing,
They speak the fateful word,
The story that the foaming seas are bringing,
The song the mountains heard.

They sing of Nature each new problem solving
Since time on earth began,
They show the Power omnipotent resolving
Love's wonderful life-plan,
And celebrate humanity evolving
From moneron to man.

The starry cross stands on the hill of daring
And calls to toilsome steeps;
Life beckons to the hero onward faring
Whose way is in the deeps,
Who, looking to the goal and not despairing,
The onward pathway keeps.

And ever down the rugged courses winding
Where dangers fierce enfold,
The eye of faith the priceless pearl is finding
In waters wild and cold;
The stones of fate the patient ores are grinding,
For He must have pure gold.

The stalwart heart still dares the ocean surges
Beneath the winter stars;
The sword of conflict still injustice purges
Upon the shield of Mars,
And brave Discovery still its voyage urges
Beyond the western bars.

The morn shall break to love and life transcendent,
And bring us free and strong,
Where clad in robes of purity resplendent,
The souls of beauty throng,
And visioned hosts in joy and light attendant,
Uplift the voice in song:

O Love is a city whose gates of pearl
Swing wide to the vales of peace,
Where sun-rays fall on the ivory wall
In whispers of care-release;
A land where the viewless light reveals
No deed that the love-life mars,
But hearts are free as the heart can be,
And true as the faithful stars.

There all are glad for their souls are brave,
And free for their lives are true;
No storm-wind flies down the halcyon skies
To flutter the star-flamed dew;
But odours drift from the wildwood bowers
With dreams to the soul of Art,
And Beauty sings of immortal things
To those who are pure in heart.

O City of Love with the golden towers,
Thou land of the viewless light,
Thy gates are wide; none is love-denied
Though he dwell in the tents of night.
We open our souls to the great life-call
That whispers of care-release,
And flags unfurl o'er the gates of pearl
As we enter Love's Land of Peace.

Eternal Love begets the child of glory.
In agony and tears;
O'er Marathon and Marne, though red and gory,
The morning star appears,
And echoes of the angel song and story
Drift down the patient years.

The hearts of men shall never more be fearing
The horror-trump of war,
For now the larger Christmas-dawn is nearing,
And wise men see afar
Above the low horizon-line appearing
The comrade-nation's star.

The Christ is born in larger soul-expression
And lives of vaster peace;
We find new love-lands of serene progression,
Nor shall we ever cease
From vision of new truth in sure succession
Of courage and release.

The holiest, happiest hour for man or nation
In all the storied past
Was when from some deep blight of obscuration
The morn broke forth at last
And all the glory of each constellation
Hid in the opal vast.

So, through the world's long travail unaffrighted,
Hope taketh heart again;
Are not the lamps of faith ofttimes relighted
At some dim torch of pain?
There never was a human soul benighted
That suffered aught in vain.

The might that wastes, the will that hurls disaster,
Shall fall before the light,
Shall bow the heart to Love, the only Master,
And worship in His sight,
And life shall larger grow and vision vaster
By living in the height.

The sorrows of the ever-toiling lowly
Oppressed by greed and wrong,
Who build and beautify our temples holy,
And labour hard and long,
Have lifted man, though painfully and slowly,
To heights of strength and song.

The agonies and moanings of the ages,
The griefs the centuries hold,
The nameless cruelties on history's pages
Too tragic to be told,
Are birth-pangs of a race of lover-sages
Who bring the age of gold.

There shall be noble joys beyond the telling
When Love's benignant will
To music of kind deeds is rising, swelling,
And every heart's athrill
With gladness in each humble wayside dwelling
On every peaceful hill.

Though thunders roar in volleyed conflagration,
And storm the planet sweeps,
Love hath a warrant and a compensation
If but one mother keeps
Her faithful watch in loving consecration
While her dear baby sleeps.

Though hurricanes of hell sweep down the water
And beat upon our coasts,
Though myrmidons of flame and arms of slaughter
Breathe out their brutal boasts,
And babe and mother, sister, wife and daughter,
Assault with vandal hosts;

Though Love lead upwards, now through wildest surges,
Anon through fiercest fire,
Each new successive renaissance emerges
From desolations dire;
What matters, hell or heaven, if Love but urges?
On, on to Love's desire!

The echoes of the heavenly voices calling,
Sonorous, sweet and clear,
Drift down the starless dark no more appalling
Though once so rife with fear,
Till on our souls the peace of God is falling
And we the angels hear.

The seraph-music hymns its joy-thrilled warning
Across the deep-arched dome;
The sages see Love's star the skies adorning
O'er continent and foam;
The child is born; this, this is God's great morning.
The age of light is come!