COMRADES

Come dear Comrade, let us sing —

Not to any tightened string

Struck by harpers when they play —

Let us, like the morning wind,

Shout with an unfettered mind

Anthems of the common day.

Challenge, as the waves the shore,

Whoso limits what we pour,

Protestant of any strain

Other than old minstrels know;

Follow where the spume flakes blow

Down the world and back again.

We will run the glad earth round,

Splinter with a lance of sound

Cliffs that front the swelling tide;

Till the mute soul is set free

Unto love and liberty,

Unafraid and satisfied.

We will let the fancy run,

Climb into the setting sun —

Leap from it upon the moon —

Laugh at all the broken bars

Down betwixt us and the stars,

Vainly builded by the noon.

Play, my Comrade, through the trees

Luting ancient litanies;

Laugh with every fronded fern;

Sit with daisies in the grass;

Let the river hold a glass

To your eyes, and look and learn.

Gaily go upon all roads,

Not like cattle pricked with goads;

For the towered town To-Morrow —

Walled with pearl and chrysolite —

Lies beyond the tarn of Night,

Past the broken bridge of Sorrow.