O’ love’s spill for to fill.
The spill of earth, the love that goes unnoticed and unappreciated, the words that are unheard or unheeded, the work that seems to be for naught—none of these is waste. A song it is for the wearied ones, the heart-sick and discouraged, “the loved of Him and brothers of thee and me.”
And yet she calls them waste but to show that they are not. “The waste of earth,” she says, “doth build the Heaven,” and this is the theme of much of her song.
Earth hath filled it up o’ waste and waste.
The sea’s fair breast, that heaveth as a mother’s,
Beareth waste o’ wrecks and wind-blown waste.
The day doth hold o’ waste.
The smiles that die, that long to break,
The woes that burden them already broke,