There's nothing that builds up a toil-weary soul <br />Like a day on a stream, <br />Back on the banks of the old fishing hole <br />Where a fellow can dream. <br />There's nothing so good for a man as to flee <br />From the city and lie <br />Full length in the shade of a whispering tree <br />And gaze at the sky. <br /> <br />Out there where the strife and the greed are forgot <br />And the struggle for pelf, <br />A man can get rid of each taint and each spot <br />And clean up himself; <br />He can be what he wanted to be when a boy, <br />If only in dreams; <br />And revel once more in the depths of a joy <br />That's as real as it seems. <br /> <br />The things that he hates never follow him there — <br />The jar of the street, <br />The rivalries petty, the struggling unfair — <br />For the open is sweet. <br />In purity's realm he can rest and be clean, <br />Be he humble or great, <br />And as peaceful his soul may become as the scene <br />That his eyes contemplate. <br /> <br />It is good for the world that men hunger to go <br />To the banks of a stream, <br />And weary of sham and of pomp and of show <br />They have somewhere to dream. <br />For this life would be dreary and sordid and base <br />Did they not now and then <br />Seek refreshment and calm in God's wide, open space <br />And come back to be men.<br /><br />Edgar Albert Guest<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-fishing-cure/
