Thus we will breast the darkest storm, Since not alone, And confident, Thou wilt perform, At last enthrone, Thy righteous acts among all men, And tyrants overthrow; Grant that this year’s recording pen Such victories may know! Amen.
Our souls have need of Easter-- Of resurrection light, For never times were trister, Nor darker seemed the night.
Our souls have need of Easter With sunrise on the tomb, For Mary has many a sister Who weeps within the gloom.
Our souls have need of Easter, Its lily pure and sweet, As when the day-dawn kissed her Before the Saviour’s feet.
Our souls have need of Easter, With angel heraldry, Which breaks the base and bister Seal of the Pharisee.
Our souls have need of Easter, With faith more glad and strong, To be the firm resister Of untruth and the wrong.
Our souls have need of Easter, Which scatter’s arméd foe, Whose bloody spears still glister Where midnight watch-fires glow.
Our souls have need of Easter, With gleams of victory O’er powers dark and sinister, And cruel tyranny.
(Inscription on Haskal hall, University of Chicago)
A feeble light of mummy-cloth and bones, From crumbling coffins and the broken tombs, From hieroglyphic mysteries on stones, Removed from pyramidal catacombs, Or sacred rock-hewn shrines where silence, and Dark night have reigned five thousand years,-- A flick’ring flame, hid ’neath the desert sand, And now revived, until its brightness clears The gloom of history, thanks to the toil Of sages who are following its gleam Into the hoary past, and there the oil Of wisdom find which turns the agelong dream Of resurrection to reality, And Egypt from Oblivion sets free.
He looks upon the daily passing throng, As in his day he gazed upon the world, With cynic smile while it did pass along With standards of its varied creeds unfurled; Upon his forehead, reason’s citadel, His searching thoughts have left their runic stamp; The meager hands and neck the story tell, How frail the temple of his spirit’s lamp; In classic robe and fillet does he sit, The poet-critic of France’ golden age, By whom the torch of liberty was lit, In truth and beauty on the written page;-- And work and freedom in this sage did find Their true apostle to all humankind.