HUSBANDMAN, for work prepare Tender plants of promise fair; Rise! around thee everywhere Life's young spring-time claims thy care, Willing heart and hand. Dig, manure, and prune, and train— Suns, and dew, and vernal rain, Seek from Heaven, nor seek in vain— Flowers and fruits reward thy pain— Fair the smiling land. Break thou up the fallow ground, With the will the way is found; Faint not!—thorns and weeds abound— Seeds of knowledge scatter round— God shall give increase. Father! God! we ask for bread, Stones Thou wilt not give instead— Down Thy promised Spirit shed— Toil is vain and hope is dead, Till Thou quicken these. We have seen—we daily see, Plant of hope, some fair young tree, In the soft winds waving free, Green and full of sap is he— Rich the promised bloom. Look again! A hot simoom Scorches tree, and branch, and bloom— Write in blood the drunkard's doom, Quenched in misery, guilt, and gloom, Finds an early tomb. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...UNDER A PATCHED SAIL by MARIANNE MOORE A WINTER NIGHT by WILLIAM BARNES ENGLAND (2) by WALTER JOHN DE LA MARE THE OLD FAMILIAR FACES by CHARLES LAMB MARIPOSA by EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY CHRIST IN FLANDERS by LUCY WHITMELL AN EARNEST SUIT [TO HIS UNKIND MISTRESS NOT TO FORESAKE HIM] by THOMAS WYATT |