What sound was that? A pheasant's whir? What stroke was that? Lean low thine ear. Is that the stroke of the carpenter, That far, faint echo that we hear? Is that the sound that sometime Bedouins tell Of hammer stroke as from His hand it fell? Is it the stroke of the carpenter, Through eighteen hundred years and more Still sounding down the hallowed stir Of patient toil; as when He wore The leathern dress, -- the echo of a sound That thrills for aye the toiling, sensate ground? Hear Mary weaving! Listen! Hear The thud of loom at weaving time In Nazareth. I weave this dear Tradition with my lowly rhyme. Believing everywhere that she may hear The sound of toil, sweet Mary bends an ear. Yea, this the toil that Jesus knew; Yet we complain if we must bear. Are we more dear? Are we more true? Give us, O God, and do not spare! Give us to bear as Christ and Mary bore With toil by leaf-girt Nazareth of yore! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE STARLING; SONNET by AMY LOWELL PETER STUYVESANT'S NEW YEAR'S CALL, 1 JAN. 1661 by EDMUND CLARENCE STEDMAN THE FRONTIER GUARD by ANTON ALEXANDER VON AUERSPERG POLYHYMNIA: FRAGMENTS by WILLIAM BASSE |