What We Must Do
What we must do and may not do.
This is the World’s whole refrain,
Till beating on the wearied brain,
We wonder what is true.
My love! my love! who passes by,
As Fate hath willed ere we were born,
Could I but face the people’s scorn,
And tell my love, or die.
But this is not a woman’s part,
A careless brow you dare to show;
She smiles upon you as you go,
To hide a breaking heart.
My friend did take my hand to-day,
Light kisses laid upon my face;
My sad reproach was in its place—
She could not tell me Nay!
How poor we are with all our laws
Of ever-changing form and dress!
The world becomes a weariness,
Life’s current choked with straws.
I sometimes think the brain more wise
Where madness reason hath out-thrown,
And gave the fool a life his own,
That had no guilt in lies—
Than we, who claim to Reason’s rule
And chain our freedom ruthlessly,
Not to what is, but what must be—
Forever in a school.
The ox, the ass, 'neath Nature’s dome,
Follow His teachings without strife;
And yet they reach the heights of life,
And bring their harvest home.
I ask, O World, a wider sight
For men, that they to see be strong—
Your little wrongs that are not wrong,
Your little rights that are not right.
There’s not so much sin here below
As petty fashions make believe;
Yet so the world’s sad eyes deceive—
Sin is much greater than they know.
