FALL 2001
Susan Coolidge
Every day is a fresh beginning,
Every morn is the world made new;
You who are weary of sorrow and sinning,
Here is a beautiful hope for you,
A hope for me and a hope for you.Ah, the past things are past and over,
The tasks are done, and the tears are shed.
Yesterday’s errors let yesterday cover;
Yesterday’s wounds, which smarted and bled,
Are healed with the healing which night has shed.Let them go, since we cannot relieve them,
Cannot undo and cannot atone.
God in His mercy receive, forgive them!
Only the new days are our own.
Today is ours, and today alone.Here are the skies all burnished brightly;
Here is the spent earth all reborn;
Here are the tired limbs springing lightly,
To face the sun and to share with the morn,
In the chrism of dew and the cool of dawn.Every day is a fresh beginning,
Listen, my soul, to the glad refrain,
And, spite of old sorrow and older sinning,
And puzzles forecasted, and possible pain,
Take heart with the day and begin again.
[This poem is a personal favorite of, and often quoted by, Emma Engle of Mickleton MM. Emma, who is now 94, learned it from her mother. Susan Coolidge (1835–1905) wrote verse, essays, and a very popular (at the time) children’s book series entitled What Katy Did—Ed.]RETURN TO TABLE OF CONTENTS
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Wednesday, February 18, 2004 at 08:19 AM
