The Truth Teller
Ella Wheeler Wilcox 1855 (Janesville) – 1919
The Truth Teller lifts the curtain,
And shows us the people's plight;
And everything seems uncertain,
And nothing at all looks right.
Yet out of the blackness groping,
My heart finds a world in bloom;
For it somehow is fashioned for hoping,
And it cannot live in the gloom.
He tells us from border to border,
That race is warring with race;
With riot and mad disorder,
The earth is a wretched place;
And yet ere the sun is setting
I am thinking of peace, not strife;
For my heart has a way of forgetting
All things save the joy of life.
I heard in my Youth's beginning
That earth was a region of woe,
And trouble, and sorrow, and sinning:
The Truth Teller told me so.
I knew it was true, and tragic;
And I mourned over much that was wrong;
And then, by some curious magic,
The heart of me burst into song.
The years have been going, going,
A mixture of pleasure and pain;
But the Truth Teller's books are showing
That evil is on the gain.
And I know that I ought to be grieving,
And I should be too sad to sing;
But somehow I keep on believing
That life is a glorious thing.
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:04 min read
- 68 Views
Quick analysis:
Scheme | ABABCDCD EFEFCGCG CHCHIJIJ CKCKCCCC |
---|---|
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 1,051 |
Words | 211 |
Stanzas | 4 |
Stanza Lengths | 8, 8, 8, 8 |
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"The Truth Teller" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 25 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem/10916/the-truth-teller>.
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