Along by the brook of devastation
They linger; the careless ones,
They dance and they dream
By the side of the stream,
As long as the brook runs

It seems all so pleasant and merry –
No thought of the next day is theirs,
And their faces are bright
With the sun of delight,
And they dream of no night-ominous cares.

The women wear garlanded locks,
The men have rings on their hands,
And they sing in their hilarity,
For they think they are at liberty –
They don’t know the dangerous sands

Ah, but this be a adventurous voyage,
Forever those sands are cinder cleft,
And a step to one edge
Means a grasp of the surge,
And the current is frightful and swift.

For once in the brook of devastation,
What strikes it, to do or to defy,
For down we must go
In the riotous flow,
To the forsaken sea of Misery