The Bridge Builder

 (Sometimes, I suspect for many of us, our efforts to preserve some measure of the past or pass along some measure of knowledge or revive a forgotten skill can seem like hopeless, pointless tasks.  I found this poem over the weekend.  It reminded me that I am likely doing this not just for myself, but for those we do not know coming after us, who will appreciate our efforts even though we remain unknown.)

The Bridge Builder

An old man going a lone highway
Came at the evening, cold and gray,
To a chasm, vast, and deep and wide,
Through which was flowing a sullen tide.

The old man crossed in the twilight dim;
The sullen stream had no fear for him;
But he turned, when safe on the other side,
And built a bridge to span the tide.

"Old man," said a fellow pilgrim, near,
"You are wasting strength with building here;
Your journey will end with the ending day;
You never again will pass this way;
You've crossed the chasm, deep and wide-
Why build you this bridge at the evening tide?"

The builder 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, that has been naught to me,
To that fair-haired youth may a pitfall be.
He, too, must cross in the twilight dim;
Good friend, I am building this bridge for him."

- Will Allen Dromgoole (circa 1900)