UNBIDDEN to the feast where friends have brought, To greet thy seventy years, their wreaths of rhyme, -- For that thy form erect such weight of time Should bear, was never present to my thought, -- Whittier, I bring my offering, though unsought. Thou, first of all our bards, hast rung the chime Of souls, whose zeal denounced a nation's crime. Thy fire, intense yet soft, from heaven was caught. Thou too the dear neglected chords hast wooed Of plain New England life, and earned a fame From whose wide light thy modest nature shrinks. Long shall the land revere and love thy name; Long find among thy songs the golden links That bind the world in peace and brotherhood. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...CORTEGE FOR ROSENBLOOM by WALLACE STEVENS THE VANISHERS by JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER VERSES SUPPOSED TO BE WRITTEN IN A BURIAL-GROUND .. SOCIETY OF FRIENDS by BERNARD BARTON SWEET WEARINESS by ANNA HEMPSTEAD BRANCH THE LORDS' MASQUE: ENTHEUS SPEAKS by THOMAS CAMPION |