We often think people shallow, think
them incapable of anything serious or profound, because
their work is humdrum and their speech trivial.
Such a judgment is unfair, since that part of our own
life which shows itself to others is superficial likewise,
though we are conscious that within us is much that
it does not reveal.
I think about God.
Yet I talk of small matters.
Now isn’t it odd
How my idle tongue chatters!
Of quarrelsome neighbors,
Fine weather and rain,
Indifferent labors,
Indifferent pain,
Some trivial style
Fashion shifts with a nod.
And yet all the while
I am thinking of God.
Gamaliel Bradford.
From “Shadow Verses.”