Methinks a blushing moon looked down
Upon that manger-bed,
And wove a mystic glory-crown
Around the Sleeper's head.
The silence issues in a song,
It rises and it swells;
E'en than the lark's more blithe and strong,
Sweeter than Philomel's,
His Church's anthem loud and long
The Victim's triumph tells.
THE DAYSMAN.
In boyhood's sorrow-shadowed days,
Which memory recalls to-day,
In many moods and many ways,
My yearning heart would pray.
'T was holy ground where'er I set
My feet, God's shrine was everywhere;
But this I scarcely knew as yet—
Christ is His Father's Prayer.[3]
God ever seeks His children's bliss,
Appeals to them; and, rightly heard,
The music of creation is
The echo of His Word.
But when the child has learnt his part,
The echo is an answer strong;
A prayer up-springing from the heart
That blossoms in a song.
Christ is the Living Word of God,
His Poem and His Prophecy;
The homeward way His Feet have trod
Mankind must travel by.