Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

John Greenleaf Whittier (1807–1892). The Poetical Works in Four Volumes. 1892.

Occasional Poems

Garden

O PAINTER of the fruits and flowers,

We own Thy wise design,

Whereby these human hands of ours

May share the work of Thine!

Apart from Thee we plant in vain

The root and sow the seed;

Thy early and Thy later rain,

Thy sun and dew we need.

Our toil is sweet with thankfulness,

Our burden is our boon;

The curse of Earth’s gray morning is

The blessing of its noon.

Why search the wide world everywhere

For Eden’s unknown ground?

That garden of the primal pair

May nevermore be found.

But, blest by Thee, our patient toil

May right the ancient wrong,

And give to every clime and soil

The beauty lost so long.

Our homestead flowers and fruited trees

May Eden’s orchard shame;

We taste the tempting sweets of these

Like Eve, without her blame.

And, North and South and East and West,

The pride of every zone,

The fairest, rarest, and the best

May all be made our own.

Its earliest shrines the young world sought

In hill-groves and in bowers,

The fittest offerings thither brought

Were Thy own fruits and flowers.

And still with reverent hands we cull

Thy gifts each year renewed;

The good is always beautiful,

The beautiful is good.