The White Man

Wherever the white man's feet have trod
    (Oh far does the white man stray)
A bold road rifles the virginal sod,
And the forest wakes out of its dream of God,
    To yield him the right of way.
For this is the law:    BY THE POWER OF THOUGHT,
FOR WORSE, OR FOR BETTER, ARE MIRACLES WROUGHT.

Wherever the white man's pathway leads,
    (Far, far has that pathway gone)
The Earth is littered with broken creeds -
And alway the dark man's tent recedes,
    And the white man pushes on.
For this is the law:    BE IT GOOD OR ILL,
ALL THINGS MUST YIELD TO THE STRONGER WILL.

Wherever the white man's light is shed,
    (Oh far has that light been thrown)
Though Nature has suffered and beauty bled,
Yet the goal of the race has been thrust ahead,
    And the might of the race has grown.
For this is the law:    BE IT CRUEL OR KIND,
THE UNIVERSE SWAYS TO THE POWER OF MIND.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Ella Wheeler Wilcox was an American author and poet, born on November 5, 1850, and died on October 30, 1919. She was known for her works expressing optimistic views and moral lessons. Her most famous book was 'Poems of Passion'. Her poem 'Solitude' contains the famous lines, 'Laugh, and the world laughs with you; weep, and you weep alone'. Over her career, Wilcox became popularly known as a 'people's poet'.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

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English

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The Tides

Oh, vain is the stern protesting
    Of winds, when the tide runs high;
And vainly the deep-sea waters
    Call out, as the waves speed by;
For, deaf to the claim of the ocean,
    To the threat of the loud winds dumb,
Past reef and bar, to shores afar,
    They rush when the hour is come.

Vainly the tempest thunders,
    Of unsexed waves that roam,
Away from the mid-sea calmness,
    Where Nature made their home.
For the voice of the great Moon-Mother,
    Has spoken and said, 'Be free.'
And the tide must go to the strong full flow,
    In the time of the perigee.

So vain is the cry of the masters,
    And vain the plea of the hearth;
As the ranks of the strange New Woman
    Go sweeping across the earth.
They have come from ha...

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

The Law

The sun may be clouded, yet ever the sun
Will sweep on its course till the cycle is run.
And when into chaos the systems are hurled,
Again shall the Builder reshape a new world.

Your path may be clouded, uncertain your goal;
Move on, for the orbit is fixed for your soul.
And though it may lead into darkness of night,
The torch of the Builder shall give it new light.

You were, and you will be:    know this while you are.
Your spirit has travelled both long and afar.
It came from the Source, to the Source it returns;
The spark that was lighted, eternally burns.

It slept in the jewel, it leaped in the wave,
It roamed in the forest, it rose in the grave,
It took on strange garbs for long aeons of years,
And now in the soul of yourself it appears.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

The Voice Of The Voiceless

I am the voice of the voiceless;
    Through me the dumb shall speak;
Till the deaf world's ear be made to hear
    The cry of the wordless weak.
From street, from cage, and from kennel,
    From jungle and stall, the wail
Of my tortured kin proclaims the sin
    Of the mighty against the frail.

I am a ray from the centre;
    And I will feed God's spark,
Till a great light glows in the night and shows
    The dark deeds done in the dark.
And full on the thoughtless sleeper
    Shall flash its glaring flame,
Till he wakens to see what crimes may be
    Cloaked under an honoured name.

The same Force formed the sparrow
    That fashioned man, the king;
The God of the Whole gave a spark of soul
    To furred and to feathered thing.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

The Message

I have not the gift of vision,
    I have not the psychic ear,
And the realms that are called Elysian
    I neither see nor hear;
Yet oft when the shadows darken
    And the daylight hides its face,
The soul of me seems to hearken
    For the truths that speak through space.

They speak to me not through reason,
    They speak to me not by word;
Yet my soul would be guilty of treason
    If it did not say it had heard.
For Space has a message compelling
    To give to the ear of Earth;
And the things which the Silence is telling
    In the bosom of God have birth.

Now this is the truth as I hear it -
    That ever through good or ill,
The will of the Ruling Spirit
    Is moving and ruling still.
In the clutch of the blood-red ter...

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

East And West

The Day has never understood the Gloaming or the Night;
Though sired by one Creative Power, and nursed at Nature's breast;
The White Man ever fails to read the Dark Man's heart aright;
Though from the self-same Source they came, upon the self-same quest;
So deep and wide, the Great Divide,
Between the East and West.

But like a shadow on a screen, mine eyes behold, above
The yawning gulf, a dim forecast, of structures strong and broad;
Where caste, and colour prejudice, by countless feet down trod,
With old traditions crushed by Time, pave smooth the bridge of Love;
And all the creed that men shall heed
Is consciousness of God.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Uncontrolled

The mighty forces of mysterious space
    Are one by one subdued by lordly man.
    The awful lightning that for eons ran
Their devastating and untrammeled race,
Now bear his messages from place to place
    Like carrier doves. The winds lead on his van;
    The lawless elements no longer can
Resist his strength, but yield with sullen grace.

His bold feet scaling heights before untrod,
    Light, darkness, air and water, heat and cold
        He bids go forth and bring him power and pelf.
And yet though ruler, king and demi-god
    He walks with his fierce passions uncontrolled
        The conquerer of all things -save himself.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox