Page:The poems of Edmund Clarence Stedman, 1908.djvu/337

REFUGE IN NATURE But thou—when, in the multitudinous lists

Of traffic, all thine own is forfeited

At some wild hazard, or by weakening drains

Poured from thee; or when, striving for the meed

Of place, thou failest, and the lesser man

By each ignoble method wins thy due;

When the injustice of the social world

Environs thee; when ruthless public scorn,

Black slander, and the meannesses of friends

Have made the bustling practice of the world

To thee a discord and a mockery;

Or even if that last extremest pang

Be thine, and, added to such other woes,

The loss of that forever faithful love

Which else had balanced all: the putting out,

Untimely, of the light in dearest eyes;—

At such a time thou well may'st count the days

Evil, and for a season quit the field;

Yet not surrendering all human hopes,

Nor the rich physical life which still remains

God's boon and thy sustainer. It were base

To join alliance with the hosts of Fate

Against thyself, crowning their victory

By loose despair, or seeking rest in death.

More wise, betake thee to those sylvan haunts

Thou knewest when young, and, once again a child,

Let their perennial loveliness renew

Thy natural faith and childhood's heart serene.

Forgetting all the toilsome pilgrimage,

Awake from strife and shame, as from a dream

Dreamed by a boy, when under waving trees

He sleeps and dreams a languid afternoon.

Once more from these harmonious beauties gain

Repose and ransom, and a power to feel

The immortal gladness of inanimate things.

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