Peaceable Kingdom

A leopard with a harmless kid lay down
And not one savage beast was seen to frown
The wolf did with the lambkin dwell in peace
His grim carnivorous nature there did cease
The lion with the fatling on did move
And a little child was leading them in love

Long ago there was a young painter
Who had a dream that every creature came
And stood assembled by his side
And he painted the sight that had sweetened his night
Fully one hundred times before he died
A kid, lion, and a snake, and a child
Wide-eyed and formal and smiling like the sun had stopped
And time had ceased to move
And the wolf and the lamb
Came and ate from his hand
And a man-child was leading them in love

Friend have you seen all the lines and the spaces
The colors that the young painter sees
In the peaceable kingdom that shines in the faces
Of people from more gentle times than these

I find myself adrift these days
An endless maze of ends and ways
And worlds seem so crazy to me here
But look away, look away
Back or forward from today
To the visions of either fools or seers

Oh my friend have you seen all the lines and the spaces
The colors that the young painter sees, That he sees
In the peaceable kingdom that shines in the faces
Of people from more gentle times than these

Such a beautiful place
Full of joy full of grace
It was bathed in a saintly yellow light
Too unlearned to know that such things can't be so
He could only believe that they might

Oh my friend have you seen all the lines and the spaces
The colors that the young painter sees, That he sees
In the peaceable kingdom that shines in the faces
Of people from more gentle times than these

Friend have you seen all the lines and the spaces
The colors that the young painter sees, That he sees
In the peaceable kingdom that shines in the faces
Of people from more gentle times than these