My Triumph
My Triumph
Original Text
The Complete Poetical Works of John Greenleaf Whittier, Cambridge edition, ed. H. E. S. (Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1894): 406-07. PS 3250 E94 1894 Robarts Library.
1The autumn-time has come;
2On woods that dream of bloom,
3And over purpling vines,
4The low sun fainter shines.
5The aster-flower is failing,
6The hazel's gold is paling;
7Yet overhead more near
8The eternal stars appear!
9And present gratitude
10Insures the future's good,
11And for the things I see
12I trust the things to be;
13That in the paths untrod,
14And the long days of God,
15My feet shall still be led,
16My heart be comforted.
17O living friends who love me!
18O dear ones gone above me!
19Careless of other fame,
20I leave to you my name.
21Hide it from idle praises,
22Save it from evil phrases:
23Why, when dear lips that spake it
24Are dumb, should strangers wake it?
25Let the thick curtain fall;
26I better know than all
27How little I have gained,
28How vast the unattained.
29Not by the page word-painted
30Let life be banned or sainted:
31Deeper than written scroll
32The colors of the soul.
33Sweeter than any sung
34My songs that found no tongue;
35Nobler than any fact
36My wish that failed of act.
37Others shall sing the song,
38Others shall right the wrong, --
39Finish what I begin,
40And all I fail of win.
41What matter, I or they?
42Mine or another's day,
43So the right word be said
44And life the sweeter made?
45Hail to the coming singers!
46Hail to the brave light-bringers!
47Forward I reach and share
48All that they sing and dare.
49The airs of heaven blow o'er me;
50A glory shines before me
51Of what mankind shall be, --
52Pure, generous, brave, and free.
53A dream of man and woman
54Diviner but still human,
55Solving the riddle old,
56Shaping the Age of Gold!
57The love of God and neighbor;
58An equal-handed labor;
59The richer life, where beauty
60Walks hand in hand with duty.
61Ring, bells in unreared steeples,
62The joy of unborn peoples!
63Sound, trumpets far off blown,
64Your triumph is my own!
65Parcel and part of all,
66I keep the festival,
67Fore-reach the good to be,
68And share the victory.
69I feel the earth move sunward,
70I join the great march onward,
71And take, by faith, while living,
72My freehold of thanksgiving.
Publication Start Year
1870
RPO poem Editors
Ian Lancashire
RPO Edition
RPO 1998.
Rhyme