Out of the night of his sorrow,
Why does the poet cry?
What poor help would he borrow?
Who at that hour goes by?
Wherefore the night as a pall
Rend with that plaintive wail
When they who had come at his call
Are holden within the veil?
Why, poor passionate heart,
Seek to awake the sleepers,
Who scorn, for their drowsy part,
To be reckoned their 'brother's keepers'?
Rather against the wall
Turn thy face, when the rod
Cuts thee deepest, and call
Only in prayer to God.
Ah! thou lovest thy brother,
And God alone by that token!
Thou wilt acknowledge none other
Sign than the word He has spoken.
And loving, thou feelest around
All through the darkness and night,
Sharp'ning thine ear for a sound,
Straining thine eye for a sight.
The sound may be cry or moan,
Embalmed in a measure of rhyme,
And borne to thine ear alone,
All down the river of time;
The sight may arise as a thought,
Quickened and growing like seed,
When to its bed has been brought
The soil of a brother's need.
Loving,—these tokens, as such,
Thrill thee with pleasure most high;
Thy lips are aglow with the touch
Of the spirits of ages gone by;
And loving, thou carriest on
The cry, and the hope, and the kiss,
Which shall bind all the wide world in one
Linked chain, of love, sorrow, and bliss.
Lift up thy voice then, poet,
Cry, cry aloud in the night;
Few will awaken to know it—
Fewer have heard the aright.
Yet will thy plaint not return
Echoless back to thine ear;
Hearts at thy sorrow will burn,
When it is heard not too near;
Glad that there stir in the air
Sounds which to music can change
The note of their dull despair,
Rising all lonely, and strange.
Lift up thy voice then, poet,
Let it be heard still above;
Take of thy sorrow and sow it
Broadcast, in faith, as in love.