Explore "September 21, 1870" by Charles Kingsley on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Speak low, speak little; who may sing / While yonder cannon-thunders boom? / Watch, shuddering, what each day may bring: / Nor 'pipe amid the crack of doom.'
And yet -- the pines sing overhead, / The robins by the alder-pool, / The bees about the garden-bed, / The children dancing home from school.
And ever at the loom of Birth / The mighty Mother weaves and sings: / She weaves -- fresh robes for mangled earth; / She sings -- fresh hopes for desperate things.
And thou, too: if through Nature's calm / Some strain of music touch thine ears, / Accept and share that soothing balm, / And sing, though choked with pitying tears.
Eversley, 1870.