The Toilers
Their blind feet drift in the darkness, and no one is leading;Their toil is the pasture, where hyens and harpies are feeding;In all lands and always, the wronged, the homeless, the humbledTill the cliff-like pride of the spoiler is shaken and crumbled,Till the Pillars of Hell are uprooted and left to their ruin,And a rose-garden gladdens the places no rose ever blew in,Where now men huddle together and whisper and harken,Or hold their bleak hands over embers that die out and darken.The anarchies gather and thunder: few, few are the fraters,And loud is the revel at night in the camp of the traitors.Say, Shelley, where are you--where are you? our hearts are a-breaking!The fight in the terrible darkness--the shame--the forsaking!
The leaves shower down and are sport for the winds that come after;And so are the Toilers in all lands the jest and the laughterOf nobles--the Toilers scourged on in the furrow as cattle,Or flung as a meat to the cannons that hunger in battle.
Words in this poem
- homeless a.
- Destitute of a home. [AS.hamleas.]
- spoiler n.
- One who spoils; a plunderer; a pillager; a robber; a despoiler.
- huddle v. i.
- To press together promiscuously, from confusion, apprehension, or the like; to crowd together confusedly; to press or hurry in disorder; to crowd. [Cf. OE. hoderen, hodren, to cover, keep, warm; perh. akin to OE. huden, hiden, to hide, E. hide, and orig. meaning, to get together for protection in a safe pla]
- jest n.
- A deed; an action; a gest. [OE. jeste, geste, deed, action, story, tale, OF. geste, LL. gesta, orig., exploits, neut. pl. from L. gestus, p. p. of gerere to bear, carry, accomplish, perfor]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Toilers is in the public domain. This text is taken from The man with the hoe, and other poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #67012; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Edwin Markham, The Toilers, in The Man with the Hoe, and Other Poems (1899), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #67012, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/markham-man-with-hoe/the-toilers.html, id L24797.
Form and metre
The Toilers is 16 lines in 2 stanzas. This poem did not settle on a metre of its own; the book it comes from is in iambic pentameter.
See other poems in iambic pentameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 AABB--CCDDEE leadingA · feedingA · humbledB · crumbledB · ruin · in · harkenC · darkenC · fratersD · traitorsD · breakingE · forsakingE
- 2 AABB afterA · laughterA · cattleB · battleB
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against iambic pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Their blind feet drift in the darkness, and no one is leading; | 14 | ······/˘····/˘ |
| Their toil is the pasture, where hyens and harpies are feeding; | 13 | ····/˘·····/˘ |
| In all lands and always, the wronged, the homeless, the humbled | 15 | ····/˘··˘·/˘·/˘ |
| Till the cliff-like pride of the spoiler is shaken and crumbled, | 15 | ·······/˘·/˘·/˘ |
| Till the Pillars of Hell are uprooted and left to their ruin, | 16 | ··/˘···˘/˘····/˘ |
| And a rose-garden gladdens the places no rose ever blew in, | 15 | ···/˘/˘·/˘··/·· |
| Where now men huddle together and whisper and harken, | 14 | ···/˘˘/˘·/˘·/˘ |
| Or hold their bleak hands over embers that die out and darken. | 15 | ·······/˘····/˘ |
| The anarchies gather and thunder: few, few are the fraters, | 15 | ·/˘˘/˘·/˘····/˘ |
| And loud is the revel at night in the camp of the traitors. | 15 | ····/˘·······/˘ |
| Say, Shelley, where are you--where are you? our hearts are a-breaking! | 16 | ·/˘······/˘···/˘ |
| The fight in the terrible darkness--the shame--the forsaking! | 15 | ····/˘˘/˘···˘/˘ |
| The leaves shower down and are sport for the winds that come after; | 15 | ··/˘··········· |
| And so are the Toilers in all lands the jest and the laughter | 15 | ·············/˘ |
| Of nobles--the Toilers scourged on in the furrow as cattle, | 15 | ·/˘·······/˘·/˘ |
| Or flung as a meat to the cannons that hunger in battle. | 15 | ·······/˘·/˘·/˘ |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.