CHILD, weary of thy baubles of to-day -- Child with the golden or the silver hair -- Say, how wouldst thou have built creation's stair, Hadst thou been free to have thy puny way? Could thy intelligence have shot the ray That lit the universe of upper air? Wouldst thou have bid the surging stars to dare Their glorious flight and never stop nor stay? Yet, casting on this life thy weak disdain, Thou triest to guess thy lot in loftier places, To draw the heaven of our human need; A door of rest, a flash of wings, a strain Of 'trancing music, and the long-lost faces! But, after all, what may be Heaven indeed? | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...A TRAGIC STORY by ADELBERT VON CHAMISSO THIRTY BOB A WEEK by JOHN DAVIDSON THE HEMLOCK by EMILY DICKINSON ROBERT E. LEE by JULIA WARD HOWE ON THE NEW FORCES OF CONSCIENCE UNDER THE LONG PARLIAMENT by JOHN MILTON THE PRAIRIE-GRASS DIVIDING by WALT WHITMAN TIGER LILIES by THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH |