WHO are you who go about to save them that are lost? Are you saved yourself? Do you not know that who would save his own life must lose it? Are you then one of the 'lost'? Be sure, very sure, that each one of these can teach you as much as, probably more than, you can teach them. Have you then sat humbly at their feet, and waited on their lips that they should be the first to speak—and been reverent before these children—whom you so little understand? Have you dropped into the bottomless pit from between yourself and them all hallucination of superiority, all flatulence of knowledge, every shred of abhorrence and loathing? Is it equal, is it free as the wind between you? Could you be happy receiving favors from one of the most despised of these? Could you be yourself one of the lost? Arise, then, and become a savior. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...BIRCH STREAM by ANNA BOYNTON AVERILL THE MOTHER'S HOPE by SAMUEL LAMAN BLANCHARD TENEBRIS by ANGELINA WELD GRIMKE THE YANKEE PRIVATEER by ARTHUR HALE GREEK ARCHITECTURE by HERMAN MELVILLE THE IRISH PEASANT TO HIS MISTRESS by THOMAS MOORE MINDEN HOUSE by WILLIAM BARNES |