When will the day bring its pleasure?
  When will the night bring its rest?
Reaper and gleaner and thresher
  Peer toward the east and the west:--
  The Sower He knoweth, and He knoweth best.

Meteors flash forth and expire,
  Northern lights kindle and pale;
These are the days of desire,
  Of eyes looking upward that fail;
  Vanishing days as a finishing tale.

Bows down the crop in its glory
  Tenfold, fifty-fold, hundred-fold;
The millet is ripened and hoary,
  The wheat ears are ripened to gold:--
  Why keep us waiting in dimness and cold?

The Lord of the harvest, He knoweth
  Who knoweth the first and the last:
The Sower Who patiently soweth,
  He scanneth the present and past:
  He saith, "What thou hast, what remaineth, hold fast."

Yet, Lord, o'er Thy toil-wearied weepers
  The storm-clouds hang muttering and frown:
On threshers and gleaners and reapers,
  O Lord of the harvest, look down;
  Oh for the harvest, the shout, and the crown!

"Not so," saith the Lord of the reapers,
  The Lord of the first and the last:
"O My toilers, My weary, My weepers,
  What ye have, what remaineth, hold fast.
  Hide in My heart till the vengeance be past."