WHEN will the day bring its pleasure? When will the night bring its rest? Reaper and gleaner and thresher Peer toward the east and the west: -- The Sower He knoweth, and He knoweth best. Meteors flash forth and expire, Northern lights kindle and pale; These are the days of desire, Of eyes looking upward that fail; Vanishing days as a finishing tale. Bows down the crop in its glory, Tenfold, fiftyfold, hundredfold; The millet is ripened and hoary, The wheat ears are ripened to gold: -- Why keep us waiting in dimness and cold? The Lord of the harvest, He knoweth Who knoweth the first and the last: The Sower Who patiently soweth, He scanneth the present and past: He saith, 'What thou hast, what remaineth, hold fast.' Yet, Lord, o'er Thy toil-wearied weepers The storm-clouds hang muttering and frown: On threshers and gleaners and reapers, O Lord of the harvest, look down; Oh for the harvest, the shout, and the crown! 'Not so,' saith the Lord of the reapers, The Lord of the first and the last: 'O Mytoilers, My weary, My weepers, What ye have, what remaineth, hold fast. Hide in My heart till the vengeance be past.' | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...DE LITTLE PICKANINNY'S GONE TO SLEEP by JAMES WELDON JOHNSON A TRAMPWOMAN'S TRAGEDY by THOMAS HARDY ON HEARING A LITTLE MUSIC-BOX by JAMES HENRY LEIGH HUNT ASSAULT by EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY CITY OF ORGIES by WALT WHITMAN |