One night I wandered on the mountainside,
Alone, afraid,
Perplexed, dismayed,
With no one near to take my hand and guide
Me on my way,
Nor yet to say
A loving word to bid self-will subside.
Yet God was present in that wilderness
To help me prove
That nought but Love
Can dissipate a sense of bitterness.
A change was wrought
Within my thought
As rancor was displaced by tenderness.
And then, like Jacob, I persisted till
I saw the light
Of Truth—so bright
That error, which before I had thought real,
Fell back ashamed,
While I, renamed,
With joy embraced my brother in Peniel.
