There’s a blacksmith works not far away,
He is brawny and strong and tall;
He’s at his forge when the shadows lift,
And he’s there till the shadows fall.
I can hear his hammer bang,
As he beats the red hot iron bar,
With a cling, clang, clang; cling, clang.
His smithy is dirty and dark enough,
And he is dirty and glum;
When a man is beating iron bars,
What can he be but dumb?
And there you may find him hard at work
If the weather be hot or cold;
He says, “There’s some satisfaction, Ma’am,
In beating iron to gold.”
Now, I am a mite of womankind,
I am neither tall nor strong;
I can only read, and dream, and think,
And put my thought into song.
But I smile at the mighty giant
Beating his iron so bold;
And think of a slender little pen
Turning my thought into gold.
I sit in my room so bright and warm,
And my tiny tool I lift,
“The battle is not unto the strong,
Nor the race unto the swift.”
But the hammer shall never cease to beat,
And the song shall never fail,
Be busy, O pen! And blacksmith brave,
Beat rivet, and shoe, and nail.
The world has need of us both I trow:
The giant so strong and tall
And the woman who only has a thought
They are comrades after all.
So, brother, be busy, I would hear
Thy hammering all day long;
The world is glad for the anvil’s ring,
And glad for the Singer’s song.
