Edwin Markham Poems

Bowed by the weight of centuries he leans
Upon his hoe and gazes on the ground,
The emptiness of ages in his face,
And on his back the burden of the world.
...

When the Norn Mother saw the Whirlwind Hour
Greatening and darkening as it hurried on,
She left the Heaven of Heroes and came down
To make a man to meet the mortal need.
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There is a destiny that makes us brothers:
None goes his way alone:
All that we send into the lives of others
Comes back into our own.
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For all your days prepare,
And meet them ever alike:
When you are the anvil, bear--
When you are the hammer, Strike.
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The crest and crowning of all good,
Life's final star, is brotherhood;
For it will bring again to Earth
Her long-lost Poesy and Mirth;
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I hear you, little bird,
Shouting a-swing above the broken wall.
Shout louder yet: no song can tell it all.
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I would my soul were like the bird
That dares the vastness undeterred.
Look, where the bluebird on the bough
Breaks into rapture even now!
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For all your days prepare,
And meet them ever alike:
When you are the anvil, bear—
...

ONE night we were together, you and I,
And had unsown Assyria for a lair,
Before the walls of Babylon rose in air.
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We men of Earth have here the stuff
Of Paradise - we have enough!
We need no other stones to build
...