Upton Sinclair, ed. (1878–1968). rn The Cry for Justice: An Anthology of the Literature of Social Protest. 1915.

The Desire of Nations

Markham, Edwin

Edwin Markham

EARTH will go back to her lost youth,

And life grow deep and wonderful as truth,

When the wise King out of the nearing Heaven comes

To break the spell of long millenniums—

To build with song again

The broken hope of men—

To hush and heroize the world,

Beneath the flag of brotherhood unfurled.

And He will come some day;

Already is His star upon the way!

He comes, O world, He comes!

But not with bugle-cry nor roll of doubling drums.…

And when He comes into the world gone wrong,

He will rebuild her beauty with a song.

To every heart He will its own dream be:

One moon has many phantoms in the sea.

Out of the North the norns will cry to men:

“Baldur the Beautiful has come again!”

The flutes of Greece will whisper from the dead:

“Apollo has unveiled his sunbright head!”

The stones of Thebes and Memphis will find voice:

“Osiris comes: O tribes of Time, rejoice!”

And social architects who build the State,

Serving the Dream at citadel and gate,

Will hail Him coming through the labor-hum.

And glad quick cries will go from man to man:

“Lo, he has come, our Christ the Artisan,

The King who loved the lilies, He has come!”