The Crowded Street

    Filled with an ever-shifting train

    Amid the sound of steps that beat

    The murmuring walks like autumn rain.

    How fast the flitting figures come！

    The mild the fierce the stony face；

    Some bright with thoughtless smiles and some

    Where secret tears have left their trace.

    They pass—to toil to strife to rest；

    To halls in which the feast is spread；

    To chambers where the funeral guest

    In silence sits beside the dead.

    And some to happy homes repair

    Where children pressing cheek to cheek

    With mute caresses shall declare

    The tenderness they cannot speak.

    And some who walk in calmness here

    Shall shudder as they reach the door

    Where one who made their dwelling dear

    Its flower its light is seen no more.

    Youth with pale cheek and slender frame

    And dreams of greatness in thine eye！

    Go'st thou to build an early name

    Or early in the task to die？

    Keen son of trade with eager brow！

    Who is now fluttering in thy snare？

    Thy golden fortunes tower they now

    Or melt the glittering spires in air？

    Who of this crowd to-night shall tread

    The dance till daylight gleam again？

    Who sorrow o'er the untimely dead？

    Who writhe in throes of mortal pain？

    Some famine-struck shall think how long

    The cold dark hours how slow the light；

    And some who flaunt amid the throng

    Shall hide in dens of shame to-night.

    Each where his tasks or pleasures call

    They pass and heed each other not.

    There is who heeds who holds them all

    In His large love and boundless thought.

    These struggling tides of life that seem

    In wayward aimless course to tend

    Are eddies of the mighty stream

    That rolls to its appointed end.