Longfellow

In a great land, a new land, a land full of labour and riches andconfusion,Where there were many running to and fro, and shouting, and strivingtogether,In the midst of the hurry and the troubled noise, I heard the voice ofone singing.

"What are you doing there, O man, singing quietly amid all this tumult?This is the time for new inventions, mighty shoutings, and blowings ofthe trumpet."But he answered, "I am only shepherding my sheep with music."

So he went along his chosen way, keeping his little flock around him;And he paused to listen, now and then, beside the antique fountains,Where the faces of forgotten gods were refreshed with musically fallingwaters;

Or he sunned himself in the pine-scented shipyard, amid the tattoo ofthe mallets;Or he leaned on the rail of the bridge, letting his thoughts flow withthe whispering river;He hearkened also to ancient tales, and made them young again with hissinging.

Then a flaming arrow of death fell on his flock, and pierced the heartof his dearest!Silent the music now, as the shepherd entered the mystical temple ofsorrow:Long he tarried in darkness there: but when he came out he was singing.

The lonely sailor on far-off seas; and the gray-minded scholar in hisbook-room;The mill-hand bound to a clacking machine; and the hunter in the forest;And the solitary soul hiding friendless in the wilderness of the city;

Many human faces, full of care and longing, were drawn irresistiblytoward him,By the charm of something known to every heart, yet very strange andlovely,And at the sound of his singing wonderfully all their faces werelightened.

"Why do you listen, O you people, to this old and world-worn music?This is not for you, in the splendour of a new age, in the democratictriumph!Listen to the clashing cymbals, the big drums, the brazen trumpets ofyour poets."

But the people made no answer, following in their hearts the simplermusic:For it seemed to them, noise-weary, nothing could be better worth thehearingThan the melodies which brought sweet order into life's confusion.

So the shepherd sang his way along, until he came unto a mountain:And I know not surely whether the mountain was called Parnassus,But he climbed it out of sight, and still I heard the voice of onesinging.