So do they cleave and cling to me, So I lead them up, so do they twine Me up, caress and clothe with free Fine foliage of lives this life of mine; The lowest stem of this life of mine, The old hard stem of my life That bears aloft towards rarer skies My top of life, that buds on high Amid the high wind's enterprise. They all do clothe my ungrowing life With a rich, a thrilled young clasp of life; A clutch of attachment, like parenthood, Mounts up to my heart, and I find it good.
And I lift my head upon the troubled tangled world, and though the pain Of living my life were doubled, I still have this to comfort and sustain, I have such swarming sense of lives at the base of me, such sense of lives Clustering upon me, reaching up, as each after the other strives To follow my life aloft to the fine wild air of life and the storm of thought, And though I scarcely see the boys, or know that they are there, distraught As I am with living my life in earnestness, still progressively and alone, Though they cling, forgotten the most part, not companions, scarcely known To me--yet still because of the sense of their closeness clinging densely to me, And slowly fingering up my stem and following all tinily The way that I have gone and now am leading, they are dear to me.
They keep me assured, and when my soul feels lonely, All mistrustful of thrusting its shoots where only I alone am living, then it keeps Me comforted to feel the warmth that creeps Up dimly from their striving; it heartens my strife: And when my heart is chill with loneliness, Then comforts it the creeping tenderness Of all the strays of life that climb my life.
When will the bell ring, and end this weariness? How long have they tugged the leash, and strained apart My pack of unruly hounds: I cannot start Them again on a quarry of knowledge they hate to hunt, I can haul them and urge them no more. No more can I endure to bear the brunt Of the books that lie out on the desks: a full three score Of several insults of blotted page and scrawl Of slovenly work that they have offered me. I am sick, and tired more than any thrall Upon the woodstacks working weariedly.
And shall I take The last dear fuel and heap it on my soul Till I rouse my will like a fire to consume Their dross of indifference, and burn the scroll Of their insults in punishment?--I will not! I will not waste myself to embers for them, Not all for them shall the fires of my life be hot, For myself a heap of ashes of weariness, till sleep Shall have raked the embers clear: I will keep Some of my strength for myself, for if I should sell It all for them, I should hate them-- --I will sit and wait for the bell.