Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, PATIENCE, by WILLIAM JAMES LINTON


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

PATIENCE, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: Be patient, o be patient! Put your ear against the earth
Last Line: Freedom's harvest day
Alternate Author Name(s): Spartacus
Subject(s): Freedom; Patience; Liberty


BE patient, O be patient! Put your ear against
the earth;
Listen there how noiselessly the germ o' the seed
has birth;
How noiselessly and gently it upheaves its little
way
Till it parts the scarcely-broken ground, and the
blade stands up in the day.

Be patient, o be patient! the germs of mighty
thought
Must have their silent undergrowth, must under-
ground be wrought;
But, as sure as ever there's a Power that makes
the grass appear,
Our land shall be green with Liberty, the blade-
time shall be here.

Be patient, O be patient! go and watch the wheat-
ears grow,
So imperceptibly that ye can mark nor change nor
throe:
Day after day, day after day till the ear is fully
grown;
And then again day after day, till the ripened
field is brown.

Be patient, O be patient! though yet our hopes
are green,
The harvest-field of Freedom shall be crowned
with the sunny sheen.
Be ripening, be ripening! mature your silent way
Till the whole broad land is tongued with fire on
Freedom's harvest day




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