The Bridge Builder

An old man going a lone highway
Came in the evening, cold and gray,
To a chasm vast, both deep and wide,
Through which was flowing a sullen tide.
The old man crossed in the twilight dim;
The swollen stream was as naught to him;
But he stopped when safe on the farther side
And built a bridge to span the tide.

“Old man,” said a fellow pilgrim near,
“You are wasting your strength in labor here;
Your journey will end with the closing day,
You never again will pass this way.
You’ve crossed the chasm deep and wide
Why build you this bridge at eventide?”

The laborer lifted his old gray head,
“Good friend, in the path I have come,” he said,
“There followeth, after me today
A youth whose feet must pass this way.
This chasm which has been naught to me
To that young man may a pitfall be.
He, too, must cross in the twilight dim.
Good friend, I am building this bridge for him.”

– Miss  Will Allen Dromgoole
circa 1900