The Poetical Works of George Barlow In Ten [Eleven] Volumes |
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 | The Poetical Works of George Barlow |  |
95
SONNET IX
THE TWENTIETH CENTURY
When quiet meadows shine beneath the sun
Of the grand twentieth century: when the race
Lifts up towards cloudless heaven a tearless face:
When the far hills we cannot climb are won,
Strange prospects seen, and deeds undreamed of done:
Look back,—look back,—ye dwellers in the land,
To us who at the century's strong gates stand
But pass them not—fast falling one by one!—
Of the grand twentieth century: when the race
Lifts up towards cloudless heaven a tearless face:
When the far hills we cannot climb are won,
Strange prospects seen, and deeds undreamed of done:
Look back,—look back,—ye dwellers in the land,
To us who at the century's strong gates stand
But pass them not—fast falling one by one!—
We sang the future, though the past loomed dread
Behind us: sang the morning though the night
Had not yet opened full-fledged wings for flight;
Born in the mid-strife of a century red,
We sang the advent of a century white:—
We sang the living,—knee-deep in the dead.
Behind us: sang the morning though the night
Had not yet opened full-fledged wings for flight;
Born in the mid-strife of a century red,
We sang the advent of a century white:—
We sang the living,—knee-deep in the dead.
| The Poetical Works of George Barlow | |