“These clumsy feet, still in the mire,
Go crushing blossoms without end;
These hard, well-meaning hands are thrust
Among the heart-strings of a friend.
“The ill-timed truth we might have kept—
Who knows how sharp it pierced and stung?
The word we had not sense to say—
Who knows how grandly it had rung?
“Our faults no tenderness should ask,
The chastening stripes must cleanse them all;