Poem by Vachel Lindsay

The Song of the Garden-Toad

Down, down beneath the daisy beds, 
O hear the cries of pain! 
And moaning on the cinder-path 
They’re blind amid the rain. 
Can murmurs of the worms arise 
To higher hearts than mine? 
I wonder if that gardener hears 
Who made the mold all fine 
And packed each gentle seedling down 
So carefully in line? 

I watched the red rose reaching up 
To ask him if he heard 
Those cries that stung the evening earth 
Till all the rose-roots stirred. 
She asked him if he felt the hate 
That burned beneath them there. 
She asked him if he heard the curse 
Of worms in black despair. 
He kissed the rose. What did it mean? 
What of the rose’s prayer? 

Down, down where rain has never come 
They fight in burning graves, 
Bleeding and drinking blood 
Within those venom-caves. 
Blaspheming still the gardener’s name, 
They live and hate and go. 
I wonder if the gardener heard 
The rose that told him so?

1. What the Sexton Said
2. Sweet Briars of the Stairways
3. The Booker Washington Trilogy
4. With a Bouquet of Twelve Roses
5. The Firemen’s Ball

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