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the miracle. - Ralph Waldo Emerson, The Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson, vol. 9 (Poems) [1909]

Edition used:

The Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson, in 12 vols. Fireside Edition (Boston and New York, 1909).

Part of: The Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson, in 12 vols. (Fireside Edition).

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the miracle.

    • I have trod this path a hundred times
    • With idle footsteps, crooning rhymes.
    • I know each nest and web-worm's tent,
    • The fox-hole which the woodchucks rent,
    • Maple and oak, the old Divan
    • Self-planted twice, like the banian.
    • I know not why I came again
    • Unless to learn it ten times ten.
    • To read the sense the woods impart
    • You must bring the throbbing heart.
    • Love is aye the counterforce,—
    • Terror and Hope and wild Remorse,
    • Newest knowledge, fiery thought,
    • Or Duty to grand purpose wrought.
    • Wandering yester morn the brake,
    • I reached this heath beside the lake,
    • And oh, the wonder of the power,
    • The deeper secret of the hour!
    • Nature, the supplement of man,
    • His hidden sense interpret can;—
    • What friend to friend cannot convey
    • Shall the dumb bird instructed say.
    • Passing yonder oak, I heard
    • Sharp accents of my woodland bird;
    • I watched the singer with delight,—
    • But mark what changed my joy to fright,—
    • When that bird sang, I gave the theme,
    • That wood-bird sang my last night's dream,
    • A brown wren was the Daniel
    • That pierced my trance its drift to tell,
    • Knew my quarrel, how and why,
    • Published it to lake and sky,
    • Told every word and syllable
    • In his flippant chirping babble,
    • All my wrath and all my shames,
    • Nay, God is witness, gave the names.