Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, LIGHT AND DARKNESS, by ALICE CARY


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

LIGHT AND DARKNESS, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: Darkness, blind darkness every way
Last Line: We sin and suffer to the end.
Subject(s): Light; Darkness; Hope; Fear


DARKNESS, blind darkness every way,
With low illuminings of light;
Hints, intimations of the day
That never breaks to full, clear light.

High longing for a larger light
Urges us onward o'er life's hill;
Low fear of darkness and of night
Presses us back and holds us still.

So while to Hope we give one hand,
The other hand to Fear we lend;
And thus 'twixt high and low we stand,
Waiting and wavering to the end.

Eager for some ungotten good,
We mind the false and miss the true;
Leaving undone the things we would,
We do the things we would not do.

For ill in good and good in ill,
The verity, the thing that seems, --
They run into each other still,
Like dreams in truth, like truth in dreams.

Seeing the world with sin imbued,
We trust that in the eternal plan
Some little drop of brightest blood
Runs through the darkest heart of man.

Living afar from what is near,
Uplooking while we downward tend;
In light and shadow, hope and fear,
We sin and suffer to the end.





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