Ye gods, who of your mercy give
Force to the fainting, let my life
Of honour win me rest from strife,
And from my blood the canker drive;
Ere yet from limb to limb it steal,
And in black darkness plunge my soul,
Oh, drive it hence and make me whole;
A caitiff wounds, a god may heal.
No more for answering love I sue,
No more that her untruth be true:
Purge but my heart, my strength renew
And doom me not my faith to rue.
D.A. Slater.
OVER the mighty world's highway,
City by city, sea by sea,
Brother, thy brother comes to pay
Pitiful offerings unto thee.
I only ask to grace thy bier
With gifts that only give farewell,
To tell to ears that cannot hear
The things that it is vain to tell,
And, idly communing with dust,
To know thy presence still denied,
And ever mourn forever lost
A soul that never should have died.
Yet think not wholly vain to-day
This fashion that our fathers gave
That hither brings me, here to lay
Some gift of sorrow on thy grave.
Take, brother, gifts a brother's tears
Bedewed with sorrow as they fell,
And 'Greeting' to the end of years,
And to the end of years 'Farewell'.