Of all the fonts from which man’s heart has drawn
Some essence of the majesty of earth,
Some intimation of the human worth,
I reckon first the sunset and the dawn.
For those were fires whose splendor smote his clay
With witness of a light beyond the clod;
Enshrined, he made of radiance a god,
And found his benediction in the day.
And all his eager hands have found to do,
And all his tireless hope and love unite,
In some wise take their symbol from the light,
Our very Heaven based on heaven’s blue.
Tilth beyond tilth, he waits upon the sun,
The first to goad, the last to calm his breast,
With dawns that like a clarion break his rest,
And after-glows that crown his labor done.