THE SCULPTOR

In the North, not the cruelly northernmost North, But close to the voice of bright rills And the beckoning hands of great hills, A child was in gladness brought forth: And he said to himself, as the heart of a man-child may say things, “I take me this earth and these beautiful rocks for my playthings.

“I will pinch up the rocks that are nearest the sky, And make of them rabbits and men And maybe an angel, and then-- When the Sunday people pass by, Some morning quite still, except for the organ playing, The rabbits and men will hear what the angel is saying.”

And as others, the man kept a part of the word Of the child. In brave bronze and fair stone His hand ever wrought to make known Whatsoever his heart had heard Of beauty or truth; in homely or foreign places, Interpreting ever the wonderful message of faces.