UNBIDDEN to the feast where friends have brought, To greet thy seventy years, their wreaths of rhyme, -- For that thy form erect such weight of time Should bear, was never present to my thought, -- Whittier, I bring my offering, though unsought. Thou, first of all our bards, hast rung the chime Of souls, whose zeal denounced a nation's crime. Thy fire, intense yet soft, from heaven was caught. Thou too the dear neglected chords hast wooed Of plain New England life, and earned a fame From whose wide light thy modest nature shrinks. Long shall the land revere and love thy name; Long find among thy songs the golden links That bind the world in peace and brotherhood. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...VERSES TO HER ROYAL HIGHNESS THE DUCHESS OF YORK by JOHN DRYDEN MOONRISE IN THE ROCKIES by ELLA (RHOADS) HIGGINSON SONNET: TO SLEEP by JOHN KEATS THE GREENWOOD SHRIFT; GEORGE III AND A DYING WOMAN IN WINDSOR FOREST by ROBERT SOUTHEY EMBLEMS OF LOVE: 21. 'TIS CONSTANCY THAT GAINS THE PRIZE by PHILIP AYRES LEAVES A-VALLEN by WILLIAM BARNES |