The Measure of Efficiency

From the Omaha Daily Bee, August 17, 1913. By Bayoll ne Trele.

Perfection is not found in man—
    Then make the best of what men are;
The stunted daisy do not ban;
    Its face doth not the landscape mar;
When eager hands have robbed the fields
    Of what shows fairest to the eye
The stunted flowers remain to bless
    The vision of some passerby.

Perfection is the aim of all,
    But since we’re made of mortal clay
Before we reach it, down we fall
    Yet let not this our hearts dismay;
Some trees tower tall ‘twixt earth and sky
    And proudly guard the great highway,
But more blest is the scraggly oak,
    Beneath whose boughs the children play.

And while ‘mongst humans some attain
    To dizzy heights above their fellows,
Some humbler laborers still remain
    In vales which radiant sunlight mellows;
And while successes crown them not
    Tho’ in men’s eyes they seem deficient
Their work may better stand the test
    When God shall judge with love omniscient.