Edmund Clarence Stedman.
MY PSALM.
I mourn no more my vanished years;
Beneath a tender rain,
An April rain of smiles and tears,
My heart is young again.
The west-winds blow, and, singing low,
I hear the glad streams run:
The windows of my soul I throw
Wide open to the sun.
No longer forward nor behind
I look in hope and fear;
But grateful take the good I find,
The best of now and here.
I plough no more a desert land,
To harvest weed and tare;
The manna dropping from God's hand
Rebukes my painful care.
I break my pilgrim-staff, I lay
Aside the toiling oar;
The angel sought so far away
I welcome at my door.
The airs of spring may never play
Among the ripening corn,
Nor freshness of the flowers of May
Blow through the autumn morn;
Yet shall the blue-eyed gentian look
Through fringéd lids to heaven;
And the pale aster in the brook
Shall see its image given;