The grandest poem is God's Universe:
In measured rhythm the planets whirl their course:
Rhythm swells and throbs in every sun and star,
In mighty ocean's organ-peals and roar,
In billows bounding on the harbor-bar,
In the blue surf that rolls upon the shore,
In the low zephyr's sigh, the tempest's sob,
In the rain's patter and the thunder's roar;
Aye, in the awful earthquake's shuddering throb,
When old Earth cracks her bones and trembles to her core.
I hear a piper piping on a reed
To listening flocks of sheep and bearded goats;
I hear the larks shrill-warbling o'er the mead
Their silver sonnets from their golden throats;
And in my boyhood's clover-fields I hear
The twittering swallows and the hum of bees.
Ah, sweeter to my heart and to my ear
Than any idyl poet ever sung,
The low, sweet music of their melodies;
Because I listened when my soul was young,
In those dear meadows under maple trees.
My heart they molded when its clay was moist,
And all my life the hum of honey-bees
Hath waked in me a spirit that rejoiced,
And touched the trembling chords of tenderest memories.
I hear loud voices and a clamorous throng
With braying bugles and with bragging drums--
Bards and bardies laboring at a song.
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