Poems (Coates 1916)/Volume I/Civilization

by Florence Earle Coates

For other versions of this work, see Civilization.

CIVILIZATION

OLD as the race of man,
Young as the child new-born,
From glooms Plutonian
I mount to paths of morn;
And as I move o'er vale and hill,
Before me flees the night,
For on into the darkness still
I bear my light.

The desert stayed me long
Its fancied worth to tell;
The savage, subtle and strong,
Opposed me, and he fell:
But the savage learned from conflict past
To battle and succeed,
And the foolish desert came at last
To bloom indeed.

I halt not for the maimed,
I wait not for the blind;
My foot is never lamed,
Whoe'er may lag behind:
I hasten on, like the wind of God,
To the conquest He ordains:
Parting the human from the clod,
Undoing chains.

The thing that hindereth
My progress as I pass,
Is withered in my breath
Like parchèd summer grass.
I hasten on, like the wind of God,
That must unfettered blow,
Wooing the blossom from the sod
Where'er I go.

I taught the Hindoo throng
To worship: I awoke
The Pyrrhic phalanx strong,
To break the Persian yoke:
I set great Pharaoh's captives free,
The Tarquin's pride down-hurled,
And in a child of Galilee,
O'ercame the world!