TOMORROW IS MAYDAY:

THE REAL LABOUR DAY

Tomorrow is Mayday, and to celebrate the event Blogger ate the post that I had been almost 3 hours in preparing. Anyways, here's the piece of poetry that I hoped to open with. Hopefully I'll have enough time to recreate the planned post tomorrow.

The Workers' Maypole

by Walter Crane

World Workers, whatever may bind ye,

This day let your work be undone;

Cast the clouds of the winter behind ye,

And come forth and be glad in the sun.

Now again while the green earth rejoices

In the bud and the blossom of May

Lift your hearts up again, and your voices,

And keep merry the World's Labour Day.

Let the winds lift your banners from far lands

With a message of strife and of hope;

Raise the maypole aloft with it garlands

That gathers your cause in its scope.

It is writ on each ribbon that flies

That flutters from fair Freedom's heart;

If still far be the crown and the prise

In the winning may each take a part.

Your cause is the hope of the world,

In your strife is the life of the race,

The workers' flag freedom unfurled

Is the veil of the bright future's face.

Be ye many or few drawn together,

Let your message be clear on this day;

Be ye birds of the spring, of one feather

In this--that you sing on May-Day.

Of the new life that lieth hidden,

Though its shadow is cast before;

The new birth of hope that unbidden

Surely comes, as the sea to the shore.

Stand fast, then, Oh Workers, your ground,

Together pull strong and united;

Link your hands like a chain the world round,

If you will that your hopes be requited.

When the Worlds' Workers, sisters and brothers,

Shall build, in the new coming years,

A lair house of life--not for others,

For the earth and its fullness is theirs.