My Virtual Reading Room

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MAUD MULLER

by: John Greenleaf Whittier (1807-1892)

AUD MULLER, on a summer's day,

Raked the meadows sweet with hay.

 

Beneath her torn hat glowed the wealth

Of simple beauty and rustic health.

 

Singing, she wrought, and her merry glee

The mock-bird echoed from his tree.

 

But, when she glanced to the far-off town,

White from its hill-slope looking down,

 

The sweet song died, and a vague unrest

And a nameless longing filled her breast--

 

A wish, that she hardly dared to own,

For something better than she had known.

 

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My heart was heavy, for its trust had been
Abused, its kindness answered with foul wrong;
So turning gloomily from my fellow men,
One summer Sabbath day I strolled among
The green mounds of the village burial-place;
Where, pondering how all human love and hate
Find one sad level; and how, soon or late,
Wronged and wrongdoer, each with meekened face,
And cold hands folded over a still heart,
Pass the green threshold of our common grave,
Whither all footsteps tend, whence none depart,
Awed for myself, and pitying my race,
Our common sorrow, like a mighty wave,
Swept all my pride away, and, trembling, I forgave!

(John Greenleaf Whittier)

"So long as we love, we serve; so long as we are loved by others, I should say that we are almost indispensable; and no man is useless while he has a friend."

(Robert Louis Stevenson)

My heart was heavy, for its trust had been
Abused, its kindness answered with foul wrong;
So turning gloomily from my fellow men,
One summer Sabbath day I strolled among
The green mounds of the village burial-place;
Where, pondering how all human love and hate
Find one sad level; and how, soon or late,
Wronged and wrongdoer, each with meekened face,
And cold hands folded over a still heart,
Pass the green threshold of our common grave,
Whither all footsteps tend, whence none depart,
Awed for myself, and pitying my race,
Our common sorrow, like a mighty wave,
Swept all my pride away, and, trembling, I forgave!

(John Greenleaf Whittier)