From THE GREEN BOOK OF BARDS BLISS CARMAN One day as I sat and suffered, One whisper of the Holy Ghost Outweighs for me a thousand tones; The voice of beauty and of power In age upon his lonely isle, That voice I will obey, or none. Let not tradition fill my ears With prate of evil and of good. Nor superstition cloak my sight Of beauty with a bigot's hood. Give me the freedom of the earth, The word that lifts the purple shaft Is more to me than platitudes Rethundering from groin and plinth. And at the first clear, careless strain Poured from the wood-bird's silver throat I have forgotten all the lore The preacher bade me get by rote. Beyond the shadow of the porch, And the great sound that is the seas. Let me have brook and flower and bird For counselors, that I may learn The very accent of their tongue, And its least syllable discern. For I, my brother, so would live Of beauty and of certitude, By daring love and blameless awe. SOME KEEP SUNDAY GOING TO CHURCH EMILY DICKINSON Some keep Sunday going to church I keep it staying at home, With a bobolink for a chorister, And an orchard for a throne. Some keep Sabbath in surplice, I just wear my wings And instead of tolling the bell for church, God preaches, a noted clergyman, And the sermon is never long, So instead of going to heaven at last I'm going all along. FORBEARANCE RALPH WALDO EMERSON Hast thou named all the birds without a gun? In man or maid, that thou from speech refrained, O, be my friend, and teach me to be thine! GOOD-BYE, PROUD WORLD RALPH WALDO EMERSON GOOD-BYE, proud world! I'm going home: Long I've been tossed by the driven foam; Good-bye to Flattery's fawning face; To frozen hearts and hasting feet; To those who go and those who come; I'm going to my own hearth stone, Echo the blackbird's roundelay, A spot that is sacred to thought and God. O, when I am safe in my sylvan home, I laugh at the lore and the pride of man, From THE POET RALPH WALDO EMERSON Let me go where'er I will It sounds from all things young, From all that's fair, from all that's foul, Peals out a cheerful song. It is not only in the rose, It is not only in the bird, Not only where the rainbow glows, Nor in the song of woman heard, WALDEINSAMKEIT RALPH WALDO EMERSON I do not count the hours I spend The forest is my loyal friend, Like God it useth me. In plains that room for shadows make Bound in by streams which give and take Or on the mountain-crest sublime, Or down the oaken glade, O what have I to do with time? Cities of mortals woe-begone But in the serious landscape lone Sheen will tarnish, honey cloy, There the great Planter plants Still on the seeds of all he made The rose of beauty burns; Through times that wear and forms that fade, Immortal youth returns. |