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Something Left Undone

By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Topics: classic

Labor with what zeal we will,         Something still remains undone,     Something uncompleted still         Waits the rising of the sun.     By the bedside, on the stair,         At the threshold, near the gates,     With its menace or its prayer,         Like a mendicant it waits;     Waits, and will not go away;         Waits, and will not be gainsaid;     By the cares of yesterday         Each to-day is heavier made;     Till at length the burden seems         Greater than our strength can bear,     Heavy as the weight of dreams,         Pressing on us everywhere.     And we stand from day to day,         Like the dwarfs of times gone by,     Who, as Northern legends say,         On their shoulders held the sky.

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"Labor with what zeal we will,..."

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Author:Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

"Labor with what zeal we will,..." by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

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"The Text is taken from Percy's Reliques (1765), vol. i. p. 71, 'given from two MS. copies, transmitted from Scotland.' Herd had a very similar bal"

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

About Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807–1882) was the most popular American poet of the 19th century. His narrative poems—including "Paul Revere's Ride," "Evangeline," and "The Song of Hiawatha"—made poetry accessible to a mass audience and shaped American cultural identity.

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