Page:Negro poets and their poems (IA negropoetstheirp00kerl).pdf/51

Rh Day, pausing at the gates of rest, Smiled on him from the distant West, And from her throne the dark-browed Night Threw round his path her softest light. And yet he stood unmoved and proud, Nor love, nor wrath, his spirit bowed; He bared his brow to every blast And scorned the tempest as it passed. One day a tiny, humble seed— The keenest eye would hardly heed— Fell trembling at that stern rock’s base, And found a lowly hiding-place. A ray of light, and drop of dew, Came with a message, kind and true; They told her of the world so bright, Its love, its joy, and rosy light, And lured her from her hiding-place, To gaze upon earth’s glorious face. So, peeping timid from the ground, She clasped the ancient rock around, And climbing up with childish grace, She held him with a close embrace; Her clinging was a thing of dread; Where’er she touched a fissure spread, And he who’d breasted many a storm Stood frowning there, a mangled form. A Truth, dropped in the silent earth, May seem a thing of little worth, Till, spreading round some mighty wrong, It saps its pillars proud and strong, And o’er the fallen ruin weaves The brightest blooms and fairest leaves.