SWEEP CLEAN.

We remember well, the lesson Taught us in our early days By the mother, who was seeking To instruct in household ways. She would say, “sweep clean my child,” As in hand we took the broom; Push aside the chairs and table, Sweep the corners of the room. Now in later years, the lesson Is with deeper meaning fraught; And we ask, do we the corners Of our lives, sweep as we ought? Do we push aside whatever Shuts the evil from our view? Or do we sweep but the surface Making that seem fair and true? While within the hidden places Of our hearts, there yet may be, Thoughts and deeds impure, unholy, That we do not care to see. Let us one and all remember, That to us will come a day, When the outward guise and semblance, From the soul, will pass away. When the things which now seem hidden, Cannot but, by us be seen. O, then, while the hours are flying, Let us sweep life’s corners clean!