Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, BAD LANDS, by FANNIE BARRIER WILLIAMS


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

BAD LANDS, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: Bad because you do not yield
Last Line: Ours!
Subject(s): Man-woman Relationships; Old Age; Male-female Relations


Bad because you do not yield
Fruitage of a fertile field;
Bad because your hills are steep,
And your canyons wide and deep;
Bad because your peaks are bare
And your sides send back a glare;
Bad, for you are hard to cross,
Stark of shade or fern or moss.

But your strata hold a lore
And your depths a treasure-store.
For your clays hold shell and bone
That portray the ages gone.
Fossil records deep and vast
Tell the romance of the past.
Age-old secrets we unlock
From the pages of the rock.

Beauty hangs like morning sheen;
Beauty floods the noonday green;
Beauty flames when daylight dies,
Pulses in the midnight skies.
Visions masterful and large
Stretch from cliff to prairies' marge.
Past and Future hand in hand
Walk as in a fairyland.

Bad lands? Glad lands!
Clay lands? Gay lands!
Sand lands? Grand lands!
Drear lands? Dear lands!
Ours!





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