Often Joy a stave will start
Which the welkin rends,
But it always breaks athwart,
And untimely ends.
Grief, who still for death doth long,
Always self-abhorred,
Has but one low, troubled song,
I am sorry, Lord.
But Love singeth in the vault.
Singeth on the stair;
Even for Sorrow will not halt,
Singeth everywhere.
For the great Love everywhere
Over all doth glow;
Draws his birds up trough the air,
Tends his birds below.
And with songs ascending sheer
Love-born Love replies,
Singing Father in his ear
Where she bleeding lies.
Therefore, if my heart were right
I should sing out clear,
Sing aloud both day and night
Every month in the year!
SUNDAY,
DECEMBER 28, 1879.
A dim, vague shrinking haunts my soul,
My spirit bodeth ill—
As some far-off restraining bank
Had burst, and waters, many a rank,
Were marching on my hill;
As if I had no fire within
For thoughts to sit about;
As if I had no flax to spin,
No lamp to lure the good things in
And keep the bad things out.