Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, FOR WILLIAM EDWARD BURGHARDT DU BOIS ON HIS EIGHTIETH BIRTHD, by BETTE DARCIE LATIMER


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FOR WILLIAM EDWARD BURGHARDT DU BOIS ON HIS EIGHTIETH BIRTHD, by            
First Line: I have awakened from the unknowing to the knowing
Last Line: Crushed us into reverence.
Subject(s): Du Bois, William Edward B. (1868-1963); Reform & Reformers; Writing & Writers


He does not lounge with the old men
on their thrones in the sun.

I have awakened from the unknowing to the knowing
hoping to see the fathomless. . . .

But I saw the old men
on their thrones in the sun,
with aged eyes
and dust in their beards.

Mixed with the shadows,
veiled and unthroned,
the brown one smiles.

I meet them at the turnpike,
but they point signward,
waving the crutches of empty years.

The brown one, smiling, led me on
with wisdom as a sturdy cane.
"The masterpiece is there," he said --
and the dread beauty of living
crushed us into reverence.






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