The Day Is Done

Come, read to me some poem,
Some simple and heartfelt lay,
That shall soothe this restless feeling, 
And banish the thoughts of the day.

Not from the grand old masters,
Not from the bards sublime,
Whose distant footsteps echo
Through the corridors of time. .......

Read from some humbler poet,
Whose songs gushed from his heart,
As showers form the clouds of summer,
Or tears from the eyelids start:

Who, through long days of labor,
And nights devoid of ease,
Still heard in his soul the music
of wonderful melodies. 

Such songs have power to quiet
The restless pulse of care,
And come like the benediction 
That follows after prayer.......

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, painting by Thomas Faed.