between,
They would not rather die.
I wonder if when years have piled --
Some thousands -- on the cause
Of early hurt, if such a lapse
Could give them any pause;
Or would they go on aching still
Through centuries above,
Enlightened to a larger pain
By contrast with the love.
The grieved are many, I am told;
The reason deeper lies, --
Death is but one and comes but once,
And only nails the eyes.
There's grief of want, and grief of cold, --
A sort they call 'despair;'
There's banishment from native eyes,
In sight of native air.
And though I may not guess the kind
Correctly, yet to me
A piercing comfort it affords
In passing Calvary,
To note the fashions of the cross,
Of those that stand alone,
Still fascinated to presume
That some are like my own.
XXXIV.
I have a king who does not speak;
So, wondering, thro' the hours meek
I trudge the day away,--
Half glad when it is night and sleep,
If, haply, thro' a dream to peep
In parlors shut by day.
And if I do, when morning comes,
It is as if a hundred drums
Did round my pillow roll,
And shouts fill all my childish sky,
And bells keep saying 'victory'
From steeples in my soul!
And if I don't, the little Bird
Within the Orchard is not heard,
And I omit to pray,
'Father, thy will be done' to-day,
For my will goes the other way,
And it were perjury!
XXXV.
DISENCHANTMENT.
It dropped so low in my regard
I heard it hit the ground,
And go to pieces on the stones
At bottom of my mind;
Yet blamed the fate that fractured, less
Than I reviled myself
For entertaining plated wares
Upon my silver shelf.
XXXVI.
LOST FAITH.
To lose one's faith surpasses
The loss of an estate,
Because estates can be
Replenished, -- faith cannot.
Inherited with life,
Belief but once can be;
Annihilate a single clause,
And Being's beggary.
XXXVII.
LOST JOY.
I had a daily bliss
I half indifferent viewed,
Till sudden I perceived it stir, --
It grew as I pursued,
Till when, around a crag,
It wasted from my sight,
Enlarged beyond my utmost scope,
I learned its sweetness right.
XXXVIII.
I worked for chaff, and earning wheat
Was haughty and betrayed.
What right had fields to arbitrate
In matters ratified?
I tasted wheat, -- and hated chaff,
And thanked the ample friend;
Wisdom is more becoming viewed
At distance than a
|