Poem by Vachel Lindsay

The Illinois Village

O you who lose the art of hope, 
Whose temples seem to shrine a lie, 
Whose sidewalks are but stones of fear, 
Who weep that Liberty must die, 
Turn to the little prairie towns, 
Your higher hope shall yet begin. 
On every side awaits you there 
Some gate where glory enters in. 

Yet when I see the flocks of girls, 
Watching the Sunday train go thro’ 
(As tho’ the whole wide world went by) 
With eyes that long to travel too, 
I sigh, despite my soul made glad 
By cloudy dresses and brown hair, 
Sigh for the sweet life wrenched and torn 
By thundering commerce, fierce and bare. 
Nymphs of the wheat these girls should be: 
Kings of the grove, their lovers strong. 
Why are they not inspired, aflame? 
This beauty calls for valiant song — 

For men to carve these fairy-forms 
And faces in a fountain-frieze; 
Dancers that own immortal hours; 
Painters that work upon their knees; 
Maids, lovers, friends, so deep in life, 
So deep in love and poet’s deeds, 
The railroad is a thing disowned, 
The city but a field of weeds. 

Who can pass a village church 
By night in these clean prairie lands 
Without a touch of Spirit-power? 
So white and fixed and cool it stands — 
A thing from some strange fairy-town, 
A pious amaranthine flower, 
Unsullied by the winds, as pure 
As jade or marble, wrought this hour: — 
Rural in form, foursquare and plain, 
And yet our sister, the new moon, 
Makes it a praying wizard’s dream. 
The trees that watch at dusty noon 
Breaking its sharpest lines, veil not 
The whiteness it reflects from God, 
Flashing like Spring on many an eye, 
Making clean flesh, that once was clod. 

Who can pass a district school 
Without the hope that there may wait 
Some baby-heart the books shall flame 
With zeal to make his playmates great, 
To make the whole wide village gleam 
A strangely carved celestial gem, 
Eternal in its beauty-light, 
The Artist’s town of Bethlehem!

1. With a Bouquet of Twelve Roses
2. When Bryan Speaks
3. What the Gray-Winged Fairy Said
4. The Drunkards in the Street
5. What the Sexton Said

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