Classic Poem

I.

W E did not quite believe this world would give
To us what ne'er it had to any given —
That round our bark eternal calms should live,
That ours should over be a stormless heaven:

II.

Yet we, long season, were like men that dwell
In safe abodes beside some perilous shore,
Who, when they hear the northern whirlwinds swell —
Who, when they hear the furious breakers roar —

III.

Think, it may be, but with too slight a thought,
On them that in the great deep laboring are,
Where winds are high, and waves are madly wrought —
And lend them, it may be, a passing prayer.

IV.

Thus we, beloved, in our safe recess
Did evermore abroad the voices hear,
In the great world, of sorrow and distress,
With pity heard, yet us they came not near:

V.

Or if at times they might approach us nigh,
And if at times we mourned, yet still remained
Our inner world untouched — the sanctuary
Of our blest home by sorrow unprofaned —

VI.

When lo! that cup which we had seen go round
To one and to another, cup of pain,
We of a sudden at our own lips found,
And it was given us deep of that to drain:

VII.

And what had seemed at first a little cloud
On our clear sky, no broader than the hand,
Did all its lights and constellations shroud,
And gloomy wings from end to end expand.

VIII.

O unforgotten day! the earliest morn
Of the new year, when friends are wont to meet,
And while upon all faces joy is worn,
Each doth the other with kind wishes greet —

IX.

O day, whose anguish never shall wax old,
When we no longer might our fears deny,
When our hearts' secret thoughts we dared unfold
One to the other, that our child would die.

X.

Oh! freshly may in us the memory live
Of the mere lie, which then the world did seem,
And all the world could promise or could give —
A breaking bubble! a departing dream!

XI.

So while this lore doth in our hearts remain,
We on the world shall lean not, that false reed,
Not strong enough our burden to sustain,
Yet sharp enough to pierce us till we bleed.

XII.

But now a pearl is from our chaplet dropped,
But now a flower is from our garland riven,
One singing fountain of our joy is stopped,
One brightest star extinguished in our heaven —

XIII.

One only — yet, oh! who may guess the change
That by that one has been among us wrought?
How all familiar things are waxen strange
Or sad — what silence to our house is brought?

XIV.

Or if the merry voices still arise,
Now that the captain of the games is gone,
We check them not, but still into our eyes
The tears have started at that alien tone:

XV

And we, perchance too confident of old,
As though our blessings all were ours in fee,
Those that remain now tremulously hold,
From anxious perturbations never free —

XVI.

As though the spell were broken, and the charin
Reversed, which shielded had our house so long,
And we without defence to every harm
Lay open, and exposed to every wrong.

XVII.

Oh! thought which should not be, oh! faith too weak,
To tremble at the slightest ache or pain,
At the least languor of the changeful cheek,
With terrors hardly to be stilled again.

XVIII.

Yet thus we walk within our house, in grief
For what has been, in fear for what may be,
And still the advancing days bring no relief,
But make us all our loss more plainly see.

XIX.

And when this pallid winding-sheet of snow,
Which all this dreary time the earth has wound,
Dissolves and disappears, as warm winds blow,
And the hard soil, relenting, is unbound —

XX.

And when that happy season shall arrive,
To mourning hearts the saddest in its mirth,
When all things in this living world revive,
Save the dear clod low lying in the earth —

XXI.

We shall bethink us then with what delight
He used to hail, himself discovering first,
The purple or the yellow crocus bright,
Or where the snowdrop from its sheath had burst.

XXII.

Oh! then shall I remember many a walk
In shadowy woods, close hidden from the flames
Of the fierce sun, and interspersed with talk
Of ancient England's high, heroic names:

XXIII.

Or, holier still, of them who lived and died,
That Christ's dear lore to us they might hand down
Untarnished, or his faith to spread more wide,
Winning a martyr's palms and martyr's crown:

XXIV.

Or how those tales he earnestly would crave
Of old romance, our childhood's golden dower,
Which in large measure willingly we gave,
Feeding the pure, imaginative power.

XXV.

O days that never, never shall return!
The future may be rich in genial good,
We are not poor in hope, we do not mourn
The wreck of all our bliss around us strewed:

XXVI.

Oh, no — fair flowrets blossom in our bowers,
Rich pearls upon our chaplet still are given,
And singing fountains of delight are ours,
And stars of brightness in our earthly heaven.

XXVII.

Yet never can that golden time come back,
When we could look around us with an eye
Entirely satisfied, which did not lack
One of the happy number standing by:

XXVIII.

When yet no edge as of encroaching dark,
Gave token that our moon began to wane,
When the most curious eye had failed to mark
Upon its clear, bright surface speek or stain.

XXIX.

— Lo! as that bird which all the wakeful night
Leaning its bosom on a piersant thorn,
So bleeds, and bleeding sings, and makes delight
For some that listen, though its heart be torn —

XXX.

Thus in this night of sorrow I do lean
With wounded bosom, and so make my song,
Upon the thorn of memories sharp and keen,
Well pleased while I do myself this wrong.

XXXI.

And yet, beloved, why should we lament
That vanished time with passionate regret —
Not rather marvelling at the rare consent
Of blessings which so long above us met?

XXXII.

Oh! lot which could not aye endure — oh! lot
Which could not be for sinful men designed;
For we, not suffering, should have quite forgot
To feel or suffer with our suffering kind:

XXXIII.

Oh! lot it was to waken liveliest fears,
A lot which never have God's servants known; —
Yea, who amid a world of grief and tears,
In freedom from all pain would stand alone?

XXXIV.

And what though now we from this grief express
But little save its bitter, yet be sure
In this its mere unmingled bitterness
It shall not, can not evermore endure.

XXXV.

But comforts shall arise, like fountains sweet
Fresh springing in a salt and dreary main,
Fountains of sweetest wave, which shipmen meet
In the waste ocean, an unlooked for gain.

XXXVI.

And as when some fair temple is o'erthrown
By earthquake, or by hostile hand laid waste,
At first it lies, stone rudely rent from stone,
A confused, ruinous heap, and all defaced:

XXXVII.

Yet visit that fallen ruin by and by,
And what a hand of healing has been there!
How sweetly do the placid sunbeams lie
On the green sward which all the place doth wear!

XXXVIII.

And what rich odors from the flowers are borne,
From flowers and flowering weeds which even within
The rents and fissures of those walls forlorn
Have made their home, yea thence their sustenance win!

XXXIX.

So time no less has gentle skill to heal
When our fair hopes have fallen, our earth-built towers,
How busy wreck and ruin to conceal
With a new overgrowth of leaves and flowers.

XL.

Nor time alone — a better hand is here,
Where it has wounded, watching to upbind,
Which when it takes away in love severe,
Doth some austerer blessing leave behind.

XLI.

Oh! higher gifts has brought this mournful time,
Than all those years which did so smoothly run:
For what if they, life's flower and golden prime,
Had something served to knit our hearts in one? —

XLII.

Yet doth that all seem little now, compared
With our brief fellowship in tears and pain;
To share the things which we have newly shared,
This makes a firmer bond, a holier chain:

XLIII.

To have together held that aching head,
To have together heard that piteous moan,
To have together knelt beside that bed,
When life was flitting, and when life had flown —

XLIV.

And to have one of ours, whose ashes sleep
Where the great church its solemn shadow flings —
Oh! love has now its roots that stretch more deep,
That strike and stretch beneath the grave of things.

XLV.

Oh! more than this, yet holier bonds there are,
For we his spirit shall to ours feel nigh,
And know he lives, whenever we in prayer
Hold with heaven's saintly throng communion high.

XLVI.

Then wherefore more? — or wherefore this to thee —
A faithful suppliant at that inner shrine,
At which who kneel, to them 'tis given see
How pain, and grief, and anguish, are divine?