Carrie Williams Clifford (Carrie W. Clifford), "Warning" (1928)
Divides the opaque darkness from the day,
Directs the shining of each solar ray,
Guides and controls the stellar chariot race,
And holds the whirling universe in place—
Altho no particle may stop or stay—
This Law immutable, you may not sway,
Or modify, or alter by your grace . . .
Unfailingly the tides of ocean flow,
The giant oaks and modest pansies grow,
Inexorably following the deed
Comes, without haste and without pause, the meed.
A tiny tendril creviced in the rock
In time mill burst apart a granite block.
Published in Carolina Magazine, May 1928