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The Garden
Helen Hoyt
Do not fear.
The garden is yours
And it is yours to gather the fruits
And every flower of every kind,
And to set the high wall about it
And the closed gates.
The gates of your wall no hand shall open,
No feet shall pass,
Through all the days until your return.
Do not fear.
But soon,
Soon let it be, your coming!
For the pathways will grow desolate waiting,
The flowers say, “Our loveliness has no eyes to behold it!”
The leaves murmur all day with longing,
All night the boughs of the trees sway themselves with longing…
O Master of the Garden,
O my sun and rain and dew,
Come quickly.
About this poem
“The Garden” was published in Vol. 2, No. 2 of The Seven Arts in June of 1917.
About Helen Hoyt
Helen Hoyt was born in Norwalk, Conn., on Jan. 22, 1887. Her collections of poetry include “The Name of a Rose” (Helen Gentry, 1931) and “Poems of Amis” (R. J. Hoffmann, 1946). She died on Aug. 2, 1972.
The Academy of American Poets is a nonprofit, mission-driven organization, whose aim is to make poetry available to a wider audience. Email The Academy at poem-a-day@poets.org.
This poem is in the public domain. Originally published in Poem-a-Day, www.poets.org. Distributed by King Features Syndicate.
