A Symphony in the Making

 

God is planning greater wonders. As a player o'er the keys,

Going thoughtfully and slowly, brings the world new melodies,

As a dreamer, eyes before him, through starvation, hurt and

            ruth,

Brings his dream where men may grasp it, hold it, know it for

            the truth,

God is picking through the ages from the hearts of vibrant

            strings

Things but yesterday unthought of, what today are undreamed

            things;

And the world grows ever better; cries grow fainter, die away,

As the eyes of stumbling mortals catch the dawning of the day.

 

As musicians build their music, toning, cutting out discord,

So the work goes on forever in the workshop of the Lord;

The whole universe His keyboard; planets far beyond our ken,

And beyond them other planets, and then more, as far again,

And twice farther other planets; each has some place in the

            score;

Though the murmur comes but faintly, if we listen more

            and more,

If we tune our ears to catch it, it shall come more near, more

            near,

If our hearts are kept unsullied and we harken we shall hear.

 

Till at last all men shall hear it, coming faintly to their ears;

Through the interstellar spaces catch the music of the spheres;

And the weeping of the children, and the grieving of the sad,

And the moan of them that hunger, and the growl of men

            made mad

By the grinding and the squeezing of the cruel hands of greed

Shall be hushed to catch the music; and whatever god or creed

Men may have, if they but labor with their faces toward the

            dawn,

They shall step into the glory when the darker days are gone.

 

Men who trample on their passions, turn their backs on lust

            and greed,

Men who turn to help a brother who is crying in his need,

Men who help to take the children from the spindle and the

            loom

To wide fields where summer breezes stir the blossoms to

            perfume,

Men who govern them with loving, who protect their tender

            limbs

From the thoughtless blow are helping shape the gladdest of

            God's hymns;

They are teaching love; are treading where the spike-pierced

            feet have trod;

They are helpers to the Master; they're in partnership with God.

 

And it all shall throb together, roll together, reach above,

Up to where the Great Musician, with more than men know

            of love,

Lets His hands glide o'er the keyboard till they find the sought-

            for tune,

Sweeter than the smell and gladness of ten million years of

            June;

And men, souls attuned, shall hear it, coming faintly to their

            ears:

Though the very sweetness of it shall suffuse their eyes with

            tears,

Yet the tears shall be of gladness, gushing from long-hidden

            springs;

Only love. may touch the keyboard-only love may sweep the

            strings.

 

Poems for Declamation Table of Content