Listen, my soul, to the glad refrain,
And, spite of old sorrow and older sinning,
And puzzles forecasted and possible pain,
Take heart with the day, and begin again.
LOHENGRIN
TO have touched Heaven and failed to enter in!
Ah, Elsa, prone upon the lonely shore,
Watching the swan-wings beat along the blue,
Watching the glimmer of the silver mail,
Like flash of foam, till all are lost to view, —
What may thy sorrow or thy watch avail?
He cometh nevermore.
All gone the new hope of thy yesterday, —
The tender gaze and strong, like dewy fire,
The gracious form with airs of Heaven bedight,
The love that warmed thy being like a sun: —
Thou hadst thy choice of noonday or of night;
Now the swart shadows gather, one by one,
To give thee thy desire!
To every life one heavenly chance befalls;
To every soul a moment, big with fate,
When, grown importunate with need and fear,
It cries for help, and lo! from close at hand,
The voice Celestial answers, “I am here!”
Oh, blessed souls, made wise to understand,
Made bravely glad to wait!
But thou, pale watcher on the lonely shore,
Where the surf thunders, and the foam-bells fly,
Is there no place for penitence and pain,
No saving grace in thy all-piteous rue?
Will the bright vision never come again?
Alas, the swan-wings vanish in the blue,
There cometh no reply!
A SINGLE STITCH
ONE stitch dropped as the weaver drove
His nimble shuttle to and fro,
In and out, beneath, above,
Till the pattern seemed to bud and grow
As if the fairies had helping been, —
One small stitch which could scarce be seen.
But the one stitch dropped pulled the next stitch out,
And a weak place grew in the fabric stout;
And the perfect pattern was marred for aye
By the one small stitch that was dropped that day.
One small life in God’s great plan,
How futile it seems as the ages roll,
Do what it may, or strive how it can
To alter the sweep of the infinite whole!
A single stitch in an endless web,
A drop in the ocean’s flow and ebb!
But the pattern is rent where the stitch is lost,
Or marred where the tangled threads have crossed;
And each life that fails of its true intent
Mars the perfect plan that its Master meant.
REPLY
“WHAT, then, is Love?” she said.
Love is a music, blent in curious key
Of jarring discords and of harmony;
’Tis a delicious draught which, as you sip,
Turns sometimes into poison on your lip.
It is a sunny sky infolding storm,
The fire to ruin or the fire to warm;
A garland of fresh roses fair to sight,
Which then becomes a chain and fetters tight.
It is a half-heard secret told to two,
A life-long puzzle or a guiding clew.
The joy of joys, the deepest pain of pain; —
All these Love has been and will be again.
“How may I know?” she said.
Thou mayest not know, for Love has conned the art
To blind the reason and befool the heart.
So subtle is he, not himself may guess
Whether he shall be more or shall be less;
Wrapped in a veil of many colored mists,
He flits disguisèd wheresoe’er he lists,
And for the moment is the thing he seems,
The child of vagrant hope and fairy dreams;
Sails like a rainbow bubble on the wind,
Now high, now low, before us or behind;
And only when our fingers grasp the prize,
Changes his form and swiftly vanishes.
“Then best not love,” she said.
Dear child, there is no better and no best;
Love comes not, bides not at thy slight behest.
As well might thy frail fingers seek to stay
The march of waves in yonder land-locked bay,
As stem the surging tide which ebbs and fills
Mid human energies and human wills.
The moon leads on the strong, resisting sea;
And so the moon of love shall beckon thee,
And at her bidding thou wilt leap and rise,
And follow o’er strange seas, ’neath unknown skies,
Unquestioning; to dash, or soon or late,
On sand or cruel crag, as is thy fate.
“Then woe is me!” she said.
Weep not; there is a harder, sadder thing, —
Never to know this sweetest suffering!
Never to see the sun, though suns may slay,
Or share the richer feast as others may.
Sooner the sealed and closely guarded wine
Shall seek again its purple clustered vine,
Sooner the attar be again the rose,
Than Love unlearn the secret that it knows!
Abide thy fate, whether for good or ill;
Fearlessly wait, and be thou certain still,
Whether as foe disguised or friendly guest
He comes, Love’s coming is of all things best.
TALITHA CUMI
OUR little one was sick, and the sickness pressed her sore.
We sat beside her bed, and we felt her hands and head,
And in our hearts we prayed this one prayer o’er and o’er:
“Come to us, Christ the Lord; utter thine old-time word,
‘Talitha cumi!’”
And as the night wore on, and the fever flamed more high,
And a new look burned and grew in the eyes of