I knew a man by sight, <br />A blameless wight, <br />Who, for a year or more, <br />Had daily passed my door, <br />Yet converse none had had with him. <br /> <br />I met him in a lane, <br />Him and his cane, <br />About three miles from home, <br />Where I had chanced to roam, <br />And volumes stared at him, and he at me. <br /> <br />In a more distant place <br />I glimpsed his face, <br />And bowed instinctively; <br />Starting he bowed to me, <br />Bowed simultaneously, and passed along. <br /> <br />Next, in a foreign land <br />I grasped his hand, <br />And had a social chat, <br />About this thing and that, <br />As I had known him well a thousand years. <br /> <br />Late in a wilderness <br />I shared his mess, <br />For he had hardships seen, <br />And I a wanderer been; <br />He was my bosom friend, and I was his. <br /> <br />And as, methinks, shall all, <br />Both great and small, <br />That ever lived on earth, <br />Early or late their birth, <br />Stranger and foe, one day each other know.<br /><br />Henry David Thoreau<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/i-knew-a-man-by-sight/
