The dust of a hundred yearsIs on thy breast,And thy day and thy night of tearsAre centurine rest.Thou to whom joy was dumb,Life a broken rhyme,Lo, thy smiling time is come,And our weeping time.Thou who hadst sponge and myrrhAnd a bitter cross,Smile, for the day is hereThat we know our loss;—Loss of thine undone deed,Thy unfinished song,Th' unspoken word for our need,Th' unrighted wrong;Smile, for we weep, we weep,For the unsoothed pain,The unbound wound burned deep,That we might gain.Mother of sorrowful eyesIn the dead old days,Mother of many sighs,Of pain-shod ways;Mother of resolute feetThrough all the thorns,Mother soul-strong, soul-sweet,—Lo, after stormsHave broken and beat thy dustFor a hundred years,Thy memory is made just,And the just man hears.Thy children kneel and repeat:"Though dust be dust,Though sod and coffin and sheetAnd moth and rustHave folded and molded and pressed,Yet they cannot kill;In the heart of the world at restShe liveth still."
The dust of a hundred yearsIs on thy breast,And thy day and thy night of tearsAre centurine rest.Thou to whom joy was dumb,Life a broken rhyme,Lo, thy smiling time is come,And our weeping time.Thou who hadst sponge and myrrhAnd a bitter cross,Smile, for the day is hereThat we know our loss;—Loss of thine undone deed,Thy unfinished song,Th' unspoken word for our need,Th' unrighted wrong;Smile, for we weep, we weep,For the unsoothed pain,The unbound wound burned deep,That we might gain.Mother of sorrowful eyesIn the dead old days,Mother of many sighs,Of pain-shod ways;Mother of resolute feetThrough all the thorns,Mother soul-strong, soul-sweet,—Lo, after stormsHave broken and beat thy dustFor a hundred years,Thy memory is made just,And the just man hears.Thy children kneel and repeat:"Though dust be dust,Though sod and coffin and sheetAnd moth and rustHave folded and molded and pressed,Yet they cannot kill;In the heart of the world at restShe liveth still."
Philadelphia,April 27th, 1893.