Poems

There was never a brook or stream But some rocks would lie in its course; But where thickest the rocks do seem, The banks grow the greenest moss. There was never a cloud so dark But it waned as its tears fell; And what day is there we can mark Without one mercy to tell?

It came upon the midnight clear, That glorious song of old From angels bending near the earth To touch their harps of gold. Peace on the earth, good will to men, From Heaven's all-gracious King; The world in solemn stillness lay To hear the angels sing.

A dimness of a glory glimmers here Through veils and distance from the space remote. A faintest far vibration of a note Reaches to us and seems to bring us near; Causing our face to glow with bravest cheer, Making the serried mist to stand afloat, Subduing languor with an antidote, And strengthening love perfect to cast out fear; Till at each moment golden city walls Rise looming on us, golden walls of home, Light of our eyes and where no darkness falls; Then through the dreamed-of darkness We hear the tender voice that calls, "Follow me hither, follow; rise, and come.

Yea! and so holy was the influence Of that high dawn that came with victory, That, far and near, in homes of men there spread An unknown peace. Kings at fierce war called truce; the sick men leaped Laughing from beds of pain, And the priests stood with the people in the streets Watching the golden splendors flood the sky, And saying, "There hath happed some mighty thing.

Many a house of life Hath held me—seeking ever him who wrought These prisons of the senses, sorrow fraught; Love was my senseless strife. But now, Thou builder of this tabernacle—Thou! I know thee! Never shalt thou build again These walls of pain, Nor raise the roof-tree of deceits, nor lay Fresh rafters on the clay; Broken thy house is, and the ridge pole spilt! Delusion fashioned it! Safe pass I thence—deliverance to obtain.

Two birds once sat upon a tree: "What's that?" One to the other said—"Just see!" The other looked—"'Tis a—dear me!— Old hat. " "And something else," the first one cried, "Now look!" The other, laughing, almost died, As down among the fruit he spied what shook And waved with menance bold and free It's arms, And crooked a limp and shaky knee In winds, but hung as straight could be In calms.

Hark! I hear, I hear them calling, "Here—up here!" Thanks, great Heaven, I am stronger, Slave to earthly last no longer, I am free. Oh, this pure and heavenly whiteness, Marking thee! Death shall us no more dissever; Humbly thank great God together, Thou and me.

Great are the symbols of being, but that which is symbolled is greater; Vast the create and beheld, but vaster the inward Creator; Back of the sound broods the silence, back of the gift stands the giving, Back of the hand that receives thrill the sensitive nerves of receiving. Space is as nothing to Spirit, the deed is outdone by the doing; Time is as nothing to Him, hatred is shadow of loving; And up from the pits where these shiver, and up from the heights where those shine, Twin voices and shadows swim starward, and the essence of life is divine.

"Through the deep caves of thought I hear a voice that sings:— Build thee more stately mansions, O my soul! As the swift seasons roll: Leave thy low-vaulted past; Let each new temple, nobler than the last, Shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast, Till thou at length art free, Leaving thine out-grown shell by life's un resting sea. "— O.

"Be perfect in spirit," said'st thou? Knowest thou all it implied, To drink of His cup to the dregs, In sorrow and tears purified? In Gethsemane's garden to walk, To surrender all earth's ties; Has thy soul caught the gleam of Eter nity's sun, That " Be perfect in spirit " implies? Oh! teach me, if so, that I, too, May stand on the heights all alone, Till the echo of words thou hast spoken, Fill my soul with their musical tone. Till my faltering steps are made strong, By the gleam thou hast caught of the sun, And more perfect each day I can say, "Thy will.