Page:All quiet along the Potomac and other poems.djvu/245

 A SHINING LINK. 239

Strangely out of place its roughness Showed beside the blossoms gay ;

Bloom above, and labor under Tis the world s old-fashioned way.

And the lovely idle lilies,

Born aristocrats, remain, While the plodding human toiler

Plucks his guerdon out of pain.

��A SHINING LINK.

A FLECK of light on the psalm-book shone, And it quivered slow, Beating to and fro With a quicker throb than the organ s tone.

Not the sun s own ray, for I faced the west,

And the ruddy glare

Of his sunset stare Crept even now over brow and breast,

Nodding up and down as if answ ring &quot;Yes,&quot;

Or more softly stirred

By the preacher s word, When he spake of the Master s might to bless;

Or under his solemnly searching thought, Gliding to and fro,

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