I stand upon the morning’s verge, And feel the glorious waking world; Afar I hear life’s thundering surge On morning’s beaches maddening hurled, In flame-tinged beauty, where the verge Of ocean sings melodious dirge.
I stand at morning’s rim and know That all this dream of earth and sea, These clouds and dreamy fields below, This azure sphere, were made for me: That all are mine that morn doth know, The airs that brood, the blades that grow.
I walk in fields knee-deep in grass, Where heavenward elms spread their arms; I dream the airs of morning pass, With voices from a hundred farms: The bobolink rises from the grass, Brim with the melody morning has.
I wander by the shade of woods, In roadways brown and wet with dew— The great cool, leafy solitudes; My heart grows great and lonely too, With the large wisdom of the woods, Full of the morning’s haunted moods.
The world grows faint and far away, As morning grows a dream at noon; Here the great silences do pray, With spread arms in a voiceless swoon: The fields gleam out and far away Across the hum and hush of day.
I breathe life’s airs and feel my heart Leap into being, like a brook That from a mountain crag doth start, And falls in snowy thunders shook: So all earth’s glories in my heart Surge outward, nature’s counterpart.
The over-moving fields of blue, They are the dreams that God hath spread, With dews and fires of morning too, Far out around above my head: I feel their deep, far-lifting blue, Shot with the morning’s radiance through.
Here in the brooding earth I dream The great, high visions of the soul; Strong like the swerved tide of the stream, Broad like the morn’s unbroken whole: Majestic hopes of life I dream, Such visions great a god might deem.
So clear the river’s eye is clear, So strong and fresh the smell of earth, So gladly heaven hovers near, Great thoughts could scarcely fail of birth: The very soul grows crystal clear, Like some pure, spring-fed mountain mere.
Out here across this wind-blown land, Where all is great and glad and new, I feel my spirit’s wings expand Like eagle’s under heaven’s blue: Great with the strength of sea and land, I grasp life’s problems in my hand.