To the Teachers of America

International Ode  (1893)  by Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

Presented in honor of the National Educational Association in Boston, February 23, 1893.

Teachers of teachers! Yours the task,
Noblest that noble minds can ask,
High up Aonia's murmurous mount,
To watch, to guard the sacred fount
  That feeds the streams below;
To guide the hurrying flood that fills
A thousand silvery rippling rills
  In ever-widening flow.

Rich is the harvest from the fields
That bounteous Nature kindly yields,
But fairer growths enrich the soil
Ploughed deep by thoughts unwearied toil
  In Learning's broad domain.
And where the leaves, the flowers, the fruits,
Without your watering at the roots,
  To fill each branching vein?

Welcome! the Author's firmest friends,
Your voice the surest Godspeed lends.
Of you the growing mind demands
The patient care, the guiding hands,
  Through all the mists of morn.
And knowing well the future's need,
Your prescient wisdom sows the seed
  To flower in years unborn.

This work published before January 1, 1923 is in the public domain worldwide because the author died at least 100 years ago.