James and Mary Ford, eds. Every Day in the Year. 1902.
June 4Grattan
By Aubrey T. De Vere (1814–1902)
G
In man, not men, is the godlike power;
The man, God’s potentate, God foreknows;
He sends him strength at the destined hour.
His spirit he breathes into one deep heart;
His cloud he bids from one life depart;
A Saint!—and a race is to God re-born!
A Man!—one man makes a nation’s morn!
Gains sight! A man, and the deaf land hears!
A man, and the dumb land like wakening seas
Thunders low dirges in proud, dull ears!
One man, and the People, a three days’ corse,
Stands up, and the grave-bands fall off perforce;
One man, and the nation in height a span
To the measure ascends of the perfect man.
Yet there rose no man, and her hope was dead;
In the ashes she sat of a burned-out fire,
And sackcloth was over her queenly head.
But a man in her latter days arose;
A deliverer stepped from the camp of her foes;
He spake; the great and the proud gave way,
And the dawn began which shall end in day!