At the Grave of the Year

Twelve times the sullen midnight bell,
     Aloft there in her old dim tower,
Vibrates her iron lips to tell
     The New Year's birth, the Old Year’s dying hour.

Across the billows of deep sound
     Glad tones in slender ripples speed,
The joy that wrinkles the profound
     Of solemn thought, as Life and Death proceed.

Twelve vanished Moons, dropped one by one,
     Th heavy clans, funereal toll;
New days of gladness just begun
     Dance in the trills that chase the booming roll.

In Winter’s frost and Midnight’s gloom
     The Year begins, were old and new
Across the cradle and the tomb,
     Clasp hands a moment with greeting and adieu.

Young Heir of time, Immortal Soul!
     Above the dead Past’s open grave,
Hearing the solemn death-bell toll,
     Yet listening more the joy trills’ lighter wave.

Still linger, ere thy wings resume
     Their flight to chase the flying joy,
And lay thy errors in that tomb,
     Thy sins, thy shames, and all that works annoy

Bury old Hates that stifle Love,
     The doubts that blur the lamp of God,
The sordid wish unfixed above,
     Unholy passions grovelling on the sod.

Pour there the wine-cup’s deadly bane—
     The lees that reek with evil deeds;
There lay the lust of sinful gain
     That on the poor its awful hunger feeds!

Far down the dark vault lay the lies
     That tempt the virgin heart from good
And o’er them heap the cruelties
     That pale the cheek of outraged womanhood.

All scorn of alien race and creed,
     All pride and pomp of wealth and power,
Cast in, with every selfish deed
     That shuts a brother from the common dower.

The sword and chain, and wicked law
     Whereby are fenced the throne of wrong,
Hurl far adown, that tomb’s black maw—
     With wrecks of empires merciless when strong.

And ere thou layest the frozen clod
     On all, thy dream slip lightly in,
That thou art dearer to our God
     Than his poor aliens wandering in their sin!

Then, o’er that grave forever sealed,
     Take fast thy young Resolve, and go,
So planting in thy every field
     That Earth shall gladden where thy harvests grow!