Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, A NEW SONG OF THE MILL, by WILLIAM STEWARD GORDON


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

A NEW SONG OF THE MILL, by                    
First Line: In youth we sang 'the song of the mill'
Last Line: And heaving booms across the bay.
Subject(s): Animals; Country Life; Horses


In youth we sang "The Song of the Mill"
As the pygmy power of a playful rill
Was turning the rustic buhrs around.
And slow as an hour-glass ran the wheat
While a boy and horse—a team complete—
Awaited their sack when the grist was ground.

But to-day we sing of a rolling maze
Of flying belts and bolts and stays—
Of modern man's inventive power,
While from a score of puffing throats
We load the massive trains and boats
With gilded sacks of "Gold Dust Flour."

Again we sang "The Song of the Mill"
As another wheel beneath the hill
Was wearily weaving its wreaths of spray,
And a primitive saw plied up and down
Through a log by plodding oxen drawn,
Till they hauled the day's output away.

But our song to-day is of grander stamp—
Of a hundred loggers in a camp,
And three hundred thousand feet per day,
Of whirling saws and flying bands,
And schooners laden for distant lands,
And heaving booms across the bay.





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