Each in his own Tongue

by William Herbert Carruth (1859-1924)

 Each in his own Tongue A fire-mist and a planet, 

 A crystal and a cell, 

 A jelly-fish and a saurian, 

 And caves where the cave-men dwell; 

 Then a sense of law and beauty 

 And a face turned from the clod, -- Some call it Evolution, 

 And others call it God.

A haze on the far horizon,  The infinite, tender sky,  The ripe, rich tint of the cornfields,  And the wild geese sailing high;  And all over upland and lowland  The charm of the golden-rod, -- Some of us call it Autumn,  And others call it God.

Like tides on a crescent sea-beach,  When the moon is new and thin,  Into our hearts high yearnings  Come welling and surging in:  Come from the mystic ocean,  Whose rim no foot has trod, -- Some of us call it Longing,  And others call it God.

A picket frozen on duty, 

A mother starved for her brood, 

Socrates drinking the hemlock, 

And Jesus on the rood; 

And millions who, humble and nameless, 

The straight, hard pathway plod, -- Some call it Consecration, 

And others call it God.

From The Little Book of American Poets. Ed. Jessie B. Rittenhouse. Cambridge: The Riverside Press, 1915.