Poems (Emerson, Household Edition, 1904)/Promise

by Ralph Waldo Emerson

For works with similar titles, see Promise.

PROMISE

In countless upward-striving waves
The moon-drawn tide-wave strives;
In thousand far-transplanted grafts
The parent fruit survives;
So, in the new-born millions,
The perfect Adam lives.
Not less are summer mornings dear
To every child they wake,
And each with novel life his sphere
Fills for his proper sake.