Bliss Carman, et al., eds. The World’s Best Poetry.
Volume VIII. National Spirit. 1904. | | | | II. Freedom | | Patience | | William James Linton (1812–1897) |
| | From “Poems of Freedom”
BE patient, O be patient! Put your ear against the earth; | |
| Listen there how noiselessly the germ o’ the seed has birth; | |
| How noiselessly and gently it upheaves its little way | |
| Till it parts the scarcely-broken ground, and the blade stands up in the day. | |
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| Be patient, O be patient! the germs of mighty thought | 5 |
| Must have their silent undergrowth, must underground be wrought; | |
| But, as sure as ever there ’s a Power that makes the grass appear, | |
| Our land shall be green with Liberty, the blade-time shall be here. | |
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| Be patient, O be patient! go and watch the wheat-ears grow, | |
| So imperceptibly that ye can mark nor change nor throe: | 10 |
| Day after day, day after day till the ear is fully grown; | |
| And then again day after day, till the ripened field is brown. | |
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| Be patient, O be patient! though yet our hopes are green, | |
| The harvest-field of Freedom shall be crowned with the sunny sheen. | |
| Be ripening, be ripening! mature your silent way | 15 |
| Till the whole broad land is tongued with fire on Freedom’s harvest day. | | | | |
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