[Editor: This poem by Menie Parkes was published in Poems (1867).]
Hymn of Progress.
We are toiling onward!
Tho’ the path is rough,
Could we reason clearly,
’Tis but rough enough:—
For the air is deadly —
But for jolts and jars
We should sink resistless,
Die beneath the stars.
We are treading onward!
Every step blood-stained;
Yet, by all this anguish,
Endurance shall be gained;
Power to stem the flowing,
Roaring sea of strife,
And to battle firmly
For the prize of Life.
We are struggling onward!
Through the lingering years,
Tho’ each one is stringing
Its new chain of tears
On our whitening hairs —
Yet the sobbing sorrow,
These hot tears, hard cares,
Shall seem nought to-morrow.
We are hastening onward!
What can hold us back,
When each eager footstep
Shorteneth the track?
When each breath we utter
Leaves one less to come;
And each mile we’ve trodden,
One less is to roam.
There is cloud behind us,
Cloud is on before,
And a mist around us
Which is gathering more:
But the word is Onward!
Onward, inch or yard!
Is the distance lessening? —
Let the toil be hard.
Onward! Faith and reason
Both are on our side;
They will not have us falter,
Nor wait for wind and tide.
Come sadness or come gladness, —
Come everything but fear, —
Our goal is far beyond us;
We must not tarry here!
Source:
Menie Parkes, Poems, F. Cunninghame, Sydney, [1867], pages 13-14
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