After All

After all and after all
When the song is sung

And swallowed up in silence
It were more real unsung. . . .

After all and after all
When the lips have stirred
Such a little of the thought
Is transmuted in the word. . . . . .

Suffer not my ears with hearing
Suffer not your thoughts with speech.
Let us feel into our meaning
And thus know the all of each.

Credit

From Caroling Dusk (Harper & Brothers, 1927), edited by Countee Cullen. This poem is in the public domain.