Explore "Songs for the People" by Frances Ellen Watkins Harper on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Let me make the songs for the people, / Songs for the old and young; / Songs to stir like a battle-cry / Wherever they are sung.
Not for the clashing of sabres, / For carnage nor for strife; / But songs to thrill the hearts of men / With more abundant life.
Let me make the songs for the weary, / Amid life's fever and fret, / Till hearts shall relax their tension, / And careworn brows forget.
Let me sing for little children, / Before their footsteps stray, / Sweet anthems of love and duty, / To float o'er life's highway.
I would sing for the poor and aged, / When shadows dim their sight; / Of the bright and restful mansions, / Where there shall be no night.
Our world, so worn and weary, / Needs music, pure and strong, / To hush the jangle and discords / Of sorrow, pain, and wrong.
Music to soothe all its sorrow, / Till war and crime shall cease; / And the hearts of men grown tender / Girdle the world with peace.