In the old house across the road
With weather-beaten front, like the furrowed face of an old man,
The lights are out forever, the windows are broken,
And the oaken posts are warped;
The storms beat into the rooms as the passion of the world
Racked and buffeted those who once dwelt in them. 
The psalm and the morning prayer are silent. 
But the walls remain visible witnesses of faith
That knew no wavering or shadow of turning. 
They have withstood sun and northern blast,
They have outlasted the unceasing strife
Of forces leagued to tear them down. 
Under the stars and the clouds, under the summer sun,
Beaten by rain and wind, covered with tender vines,
The walls stand symbols of a granite race,
The measure and translation of olden times.

In the rough epic of their life, their toil, their creeds,
Their psalms, their prayers, what stirring tales
Of days that were their past had they to tell
Their children to keep the new faith burning? 
Tales of grandsires in the fatherland
Whose faith was seven times tried in fiery furnaces,—­
Of Rowland Taylor who kissed the stake,
And stood with hands folded and eyes steadfastly turned
To the sky, and smiled upon the flames;
Of Latimer, and of Cranmer who for cowardice heroically atoned—­
Who thrust his right hand into the fire
Because it had broken plight with his heart
And written against the voice of his conviction. 
With such memories they exalted and cherished
The heroism of their tried souls,
And ours are wrung with doubt and self-distrust!

I am kneeling on the odorous earth;
The sweet, shy feet of Spring come tripping o’er the land,
Winter is fled to the hills, leaving snowy wreaths
On apple-tree, meadow, and marsh. 
The walls are astir; little waves of blue
Run through my fingers murmuring: 
“We follow the winds and the snow!”
Their heart is a cup of gold. 
Soft whispers of showers and flowers
Are mingled in the spring song of the walls. 
Hark to the songs that go singing like the wind
Through the chinks of the wall and thrill the heart
And quicken it with passionate response! 
The walls sing the song of wild bird, the hoof-beat of deer,
The murmur of pine and cedar, the ripple of many streams;
Crows are calling from the Druidical wood;
The morning mist still haunts the meadows
Like the ghosts of the wall builders.

As I listen, methinks I hear the bitter plaint
Of the passing of a haughty race,
The wronged, friendly, childlike, peaceable tribes,
The swarthy archers of the wilderness,
The red men to whom Nature opened all her secrets,
Who knew the haunts of bird and fish,
The hidden virtue of herb and root;
All the travail of man and beast they knew—­
Birth and death, heat and cold,
Hunger and thirst, love and hate;
For these are the unchanging things writ in the imperishable book of life
That man suckled at the breast of woman must know.