Edwin Markham (born Charles Edward Anson Markham April 23, 1852 – March 7, 1940) was an American poet. From 1923 to 1931 he was Poet Laureate of Oregon.
It is better to rust out than wear out.
I (God) will leave man to make the fateful guess, Will leave him torn between the no and yes, Leave him unresting till he rests in me, Drawn upward by the choice that makes him free, Leave him in tragic loneliness to choose, With all in life to win or all to lose.
The thing that is incredible is life itself.
Defeat may serve as well as victory to shake the soul and let the glory out.
No soul can be forever banned, Eternally bereft, Whoever falls from God's right hand Is caught into his left.
The sequoias belong to the silences of the milleniums. Many of them have seen a hundred human generations rise, give off their little clamors and perish. They seem indeed to be forms of immortality standing here amoing the transitory shapes of time.
Ah, great it is to believe the dream as we stand in youth by the starry stream; but a greater thing is to fight life through and say at the end, the dream is true!
The crest and crowning of all good, life's final star, is Brotherhood.
He fed his spirit with the bread of books
We are all blind until we see That in the human plan Nothing is worth the making If it does not make the man. Why build these cities glorious If man unbuilded goes? We build the world in vain Unless the builders also grow.