The Wings of Oppression
I have a song that few will sing
In honor of all suffering,
A song to which my heart can bring
The homage of believing—
A song the heavy-laden hears
Above the clamor of his fears,
While still he walks with blinding tears,
And drains the cup of grieving.
I ask not why, I only see
How poor is all our potency,
How soon the wise, the strong, the free
Some deadly bane discloses;
While he whose bread is doubly priced,
By whom all gain is sacrificed,
Keeps near to beauty, near to Christ,
And Socrates and Moses.
The captains and the gilded kings,
With all their marshalled underlings,
Are found to be but puny things,
Impermanent and hollow;
While up through terror, blood and dearth,
Poor men accounted little worth,
Still raise the beacon lights of earth
For truth and faith to follow.
So long as life is steeped in wrong,
And nations cry: "How long, how long!"
I look not to the wise and strong
For peace and self-possession;
But right will rise, and mercy shine,
And justice lift her conquering sign
Where lowly people starve and pine
Beneath a world oppression.
O sweet is power, dear is ease,
And beauty cannot fail to please,
But mightier far than all of these
Those chastenings of sorrow
By which alone the heart will dare
To mount beyond a world of care
On visions bright beyond compare
Of better things tomorrow.