23 quotes
Bowed by the weight of centuries he leans
Upon his hoe and gazes on the ground,
The emptiness of ages in his face,
And on his back the burden of the world.
The Man with the Hoe and Other Poems (1899)
He drew a circle that shut me out —
Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout.
But Love and I had the wit to win:
We drew a circle that took him in.
The Shoes of Happiness, and Other Poems (1913)
I fear the vermin that shall undermine
Senate and citadel and school and shrine.
For over the world a dim hope hovers,
The hope at the heart of all our songs —
That the banded stars are in league with lovers,
And fight against their wrongs.
The Shoes of Happiness, and Other Poems (1913)
Slave of the wheel of labor, what to him
Are Plato and the swing of Pleiades?
The Man With the Hoe (1898)
I will find you there where our low life heightens,
Where the door of the Wonder again unbars,
Where the old love lures and the old fire whitens,
In the Stars behind the stars.
The Shoes of Happiness, and Other Poems (1913)
One thing shines clear in the heart's sweet reason,
One lightning over the chasm runs —
That to turn from love is the world's one treason
That darkens all the suns.
The Shoes of Happiness, and Other Poems (1913)
O masters, lords and rulers in all lands,
Is this the handiwork you give to God,
This monstrous thing distorted and soul-quenched?
The Man with the Hoe and Other Poems (1899)
Come, clear the way, then, clear the way:
Blind creeds and kings have had their day.
The Man with the Hoe and Other Poems (1899)
If this is a dream, then perhaps our dreaming
Can touch life's height to a finer fire:
Who knows but the heavens and all their seeming
Were made by the heart's desire?
The Shoes of Happiness, and Other Poems (1913)
We have committed the Golden Rule to memory; let us now commit it to life.
It will all come back — the wasted splendor,
The heart's lost youth like a breaking flower,
The dauntless dare, and the wistful, tender
Touch of the April hour.
The Shoes of Happiness, and Other Poems (1913)
To this Event the ages ran:
Make way for Brotherhood — make way for Man.
The Man with the Hoe and Other Poems (1899)
There are more lives yet, there are more worlds waiting,
For the way climbs up to the eldest sun,
Where the white ones go to their mystic mating,
And the Holy Will is done.
The Shoes of Happiness, and Other Poems (1913)
It was ages ago in life's first wonder
I found you, Virgilia, wild sea-heart;
And 'twas ages ago that we went asunder,
Ages and worlds apart.
The Shoes of Happiness, and Other Poems (1913)
Ah, yes, in that hour of our souls dream-driven,
In that high, white hour, O my wild sea-bride,
The tears and the years will be all forgiven, …
And all be justified.
The Shoes of Happiness, and Other Poems (1913)
We all are blind until we see
That in the human plan
Nothing is worth the making if
It does not make the man.
Why build these cities glorious
If man unbuilded goes?
In vain we build the world, unless
The builder also grows.
The crest and crowning of all good,
Life’s final star, is Brotherhood;
For it will bring again to Earth
Her long-lost Poesy and Mirth;
Will send new light on every face,
A kingly power upon the race.
And till it come, we men are slaves,
And travel downward to the dust of graves.
The Man with the Hoe and Other Poems (1899)
How will it be with kingdoms and with kings —
With those who shaped him to the thing he is —
When this dumb Terror shall rise to judge the world.
After the silence of the centuries?
The Man with the Hoe and Other Poems (1899)
Our ways go wide and I know not whither,
But my song will search through the worlds for you,
Till the Seven Seas waste and the Seven Stars wither,
And the dream of the heart comes true.
The Shoes of Happiness, and Other Poems (1913)