THE TRYST OF NATIONS.

Tremendous dawn! that turns its back upon a fumbling past, and then, in radiant ecstasy, sweeps up the heavens, down the spaces of the wind, revealing, healing, seeking out the darkest places of the world. Night, still crimsoned by the blood of sacrifice, has sung its Sorrow-Song; we must forget, and pray for those who day by day must grow more intimate with pain, or some unspoken loneliness. O Dawn of Love’s completion, though earth still trembles we no longer fear imperial will, and, phoenix-like, the peasant rises from the dust, stares with his blinded eyes, and praises God. Cold Royalty, intolerable, an outcast, false and dull, the cruel lines about its lips still tightly drawn—lost in the art of savagery—sees not the new rich dawn, hears not the herald-trumpetings, knows not the meaning of a broken crown. Written for the Pilgrim Tercentenary, Plymouth, 1921.