Explore "Preparation" by Ella Wheeler Wilcox on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
We must not force events, but rather make / The heart soil ready for their coming, as / The earth spreads carpets for the feet of Spring, / Or, with the strengthening tonic of the frost, / Prepares for winter. Should a July noon / Burst suddenly upon a frozen world / Small joy would follow, even though that world / Were longing for the Summer. Should the sting / Of sharp December pierce the heart of June, / What death and devastation would ensue! / All things are planned. The most majestic sphere / That whirls through space is governed and controlled / By supreme law, as is the blade of grass / Which through the bursting bosom of the earth / Creeps up to kiss the light. Poor, puny man / Alone doth strive and battle with the Force / Which rules all lives and worlds, and he alone / Demands effect before producing cause.
How vain the hope! We cannot harvest joy / Until we sow the seed, and God alone / Knows when that seed has ripened. Oft we stand / And watch the ground with anxious, brooding eyes, / Complaining of the slow, unfruitful yield, / Not knowing that the shadow of ourselves / Keeps off the sunlight and delays result. / Sometimes our fierce impatience of desire / Doth like a sultry May force tender shoots / Of half-formed pleasures and unshaped events / To ripen prematurely, and we reap / But disappointment; or we rot the germs / With briny tears ere they have time to grow.