Is It Worth While?
Is it worth while that we jostle a brother,
Bearing his load on the rough road of life?
Is it worth while that we jeer at each other
In blackness of heart?—that we war to the knife?
God pity us all in our pitiful strife.
God pity us all as we jostle each other;
God pardon us all for the triumphs we feel
When a fellow goes down 'neath his load on the heather,
Pierced to the heart: words are keener than steel,
And mightier far for woe than for weal.
Were it not well, in this brief little journey
On over the isthmus, down into the tide,
We give him a fish instead of a serpent,
Ere folding the hands to be and abide
Forever and aye in dust at his side?
Look at the roses saluting each other;
Look at the herds all at peace on the plain—
Man, and man only, makes war on his brother,
And dotes in his heart on his peril and pain—
Shamed by the brutes that go down on the plain.
Is it worth while that we battle to humble
Some poor fellow down into the dust?
God pity us all! Time too soon will tumble
All of us together, like leaves in a gust,
Humbled, indeed, down into the dust.
Why should we envy a moment of pleasure
Some poor fellow-mortal has wrung from it all?
Oh! could you look into his life's broken measure—
Look at the dregs—at the wormwood and gall—
Look at his heart hung with crape like a pall;
Look at the skeletons down by his hearthstone;
Look at his cares in their merciless sway,
I know you would go and say tenderly, lowly,
Brother—my brother, for aye and for aye,
Lo! Lethe is washing the blackness away.