(7 October 1849 - 22 July 1916 / Greenfield, Indiana)

poet James Whitcomb Riley
#66 on top 500 poets
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We to Sigh Instead of Sing

"Rain and Rain! and rain and rain!"
Yesterday we muttered
Grimly as the grim refrain
That the thunders uttered:
All the heavens under cloud --
All the sunshine sleeping;
All the grasses limply bowed
With their weight of weeping.

Sigh and sigh! and sigh and sigh!
Never end of sighing;
Rain and rain for our reply --
Hopes half-drowned and dying;
Peering through the window-pane,
Naught but endless raining --
Endless sighing, and, as vain,
Endlessly conmplaining.

Shine and shine! and shine and shine!
Ah! to-day the splendor!--
All this glory yours and mine --
God! but God is tender!
We to sigh instead of sing,
Yesterday in sorrow,
While the lord was fashioning
This for our To-morrow!

Submitted: Friday, January 03, 2003


Read poems about / on: rain, sunshine, sorrow, god, hope, sleep

Comments about this poem (We to Sigh Instead of Sing by James Whitcomb Riley )

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  • Ayla Tulip (10/9/2008 5:58:00 AM)

    You never know what he has kept for us in store! A 10 from me. Advise what else is optimistic. Yalla, my friend, I need it! I once wrote 'A brand new page' on the same idea. I love the word 'fashioning'. Gives it a feeling of 'the traditional and best way of His'. Admire you.

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