| Alfred H. Miles, ed. Women Poets of the Nineteenth Century. 1907. | | | A Palace of Dreams, and Other Verse (1901)
III. Under the Sun | | By Ada Bartrick Baker (1854– ) |
| | | LIFE is a Battle. And those that fight | |
| Clash in the thick of a cloudy night; | |
| And Wrong has its sword through the heart of Right. | |
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| Life is a Loom. And the threads that feed | |
| Are drawn out of hearts and brains that bleed, | 5 |
| To fashion a cloak for the rich man’s greed. | |
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| Life is a Mart. And the sellers buy | |
| Lies for truth, and truth with a lie, | |
| While honour and justice stand hand-cuff’d by. | |
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| Life is a Play. But the actors wear | 10 |
| Vainly their masks; for the sins they share | |
| Out of their hollow eyelids stare. | |
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| Life is a Journey. And those that ride | |
| Trample the weak as they trudge beside, | |
| While the red blood crimsons the hoof of pride. | 15 |
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| Life is a Dream! And the soul, perplext, | |
| Feels through a fog of problems vext. | |
| Sudden ’twill wake, and—light comes next! | | | | |
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