Down, down beneath the daisy beds, <br />O hear the cries of pain! <br />And moaning on the cinder-path <br />They're blind amid the rain. <br />Can murmurs of the worms arise <br />To higher hearts than mine? <br />I wonder if that gardener hears <br />Who made the mold all fine <br />And packed each gentle seedling down <br />So carefully in line? <br /> <br />I watched the red rose reaching up <br />To ask him if he heard <br />Those cries that stung the evening earth <br />Till all the rose-roots stirred. <br />She asked him if he felt the hate <br />That burned beneath them there. <br />She asked him if he heard the curse <br />Of worms in black despair. <br />He kissed the rose. What did it mean? <br />What of the rose's prayer? <br /> <br />Down, down where rain has never come <br />They fight in burning graves, <br />Bleeding and drinking blood <br />Within those venom-caves. <br />Blaspheming still the gardener's name, <br />They live and hate and go. <br />I wonder if the gardener heard <br />The rose that told him so?<br /><br />Vachel Lindsay<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-song-of-the-garden-toad/
