Explore "Lines to Charles Sumner" by Frances Ellen Watkins Harper on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Thank God that thou hast spoken / Words earnest, true and brave, / The lightning of thy lips did smite / The fetters of the slave.
I thought the shadows deepened, / Round the pathway of the slave, / As one by one his faithful friends / Were dropping in the grave.
When other hands grew feeble, / And loosed their hold on life, / Thy words rang like a clarion / For freedom's noble strife.
Thy words were not soft echoes, / Thy tones no siren song; / They fell as battle-axes / Upon our giant wrong.
God grant thy words of power / May fall as precious seeds, / That yet shall leaf and blossom / In high and holy deeds.