Classic Poem

Out of an old-world passion
I shape you a new-world song,
And deft are the hands that fashion
Though dark with an ancient wrong:
Yet God is abroad in his garden
And he knows where the stains belong.

He walks in his garden slowly
Like a great man at his ease;
Hushed is the air and holy
In awe of his reveries,
For he is the ancient warden
Who guardeth memories.

I saw Him in his garden,
I stared at him over the wall,
The keeper of Death and Pardon
To bind and loose us all,—
He was only an old man walking,
Gentle and gray and tall.