Share:
  Guess poet | Poets | Poets timeline | Isles | Contacts

Paul Laurence Dunbar - WeltschmertzPaul Laurence Dunbar - Weltschmertz
Work rating: Low


You ask why I am sad to-day,   I have no cares, no griefs, you say?   Ah, yes, `t is true, I have no grief--   But--is there not the falling leaf?   The bare tree there is mourning left   With all of autumn`s gray bereft;   It is not what has happened me,   Think of the bare, dismantled tree.   The birds go South along the sky,   I hear their lingering, long good-bye.   Who goes reluctant from my breast?   And yet--the lone and wind-swept nest.   The mourning, pale-flowered hearse goes by,   Why does a tear come to my eye?   Is it the March rain blowing wild?   I have no dead, I know no child.   I am no widow by the bier   Of him I held supremely dear.   I have not seen the choicest one   Sink down as sinks the westering sun.   Faith unto faith have I beheld,   For me, few solemn notes have swelled;   Love bekoned me out to the dawn,   And happily I followed on.   And yet my heart goes out to them   Whose sorrow is their diadem;   The falling leaf, the crying bird,   The voice to be, all lost, unheard--   Not mine, not mine, and yet too much   The thrilling power of human touch,   While all the world looks on and scorns   I wear another`s crown of thorns.   Count me a priest who understands   The glorious pain of nail-pierced hands;   Count me a comrade of the thief   Hot driven into late belief.   Oh, mother`s tear, oh, father`s sigh,   Oh, mourning sweetheart`s last good-bye,   I yet have known no mourning save   Beside some brother`s brother`s grave.
Source

The script ran 0.002 seconds.