SEVEN TIMES FIVE.-WIDOWHOOD

I SLEEP and rest, my heart makes moan Before I am well awake;

"Let me bleed! O let me alone,

Since I must not break!"

For children wake, though fathers sleep

With a stone at foot and at head:

O sleepless God, forever keep,

Keep both living and dead!

I lift mine eyes, and what to see
But a world happy and fair!

I have not wished it to mourn with me,-
Comfort is not there.

Oh, what anear but golden brooms,

But a waste of reedy rills!

Oh, what afar but the fine glooms

On the rare blue hills!

I shall not die, but live forlore,—
How bitter it is to part!

Oh, to meet thee, my love, once more!
O my heart, my heart!

No more to hear, no more to see!
Oh, that an echo might wake
And waft one note of thy psalm to me
Ere my heart-strings break!

I should know it how faint soe'er,
And with angel voices blent;
Oh, once to feel thy spirit anear;

I could be content!

Or once between the gates of gold,
While an entering angel trod,
But once, thee sitting to behold
On the hills of God!

Songs of Seven

SEVEN TIMES SIX.-GIVING IN MARRIAGE

To bear, to nurse, to rear,

To watch, and then to lose:
To see my bright ones disappear,
Drawn up like morning dews,—

To bear, to nurse, to rear,

To watch and then to lose:

This have I done when God drew near
Among his own to choose.

To hear, to heed, to wed,

And with thy lord depart

In tears, that he, as soon as shed,

Will let no longer smart,

To hear, to heed, to wed,

This while thou didst I smiled, For now it was not God who said, "Mother, give ME thy child."

O fond, O fool, and blind!

To God I gave with tears;

But when a man like grace would find,

My soul put by her fears,

O fond, O fool, and blind!

God guards in happier spheres;

That man will guard where he did bind

Is hope for unknown years.

To hear, to heed, to wed,

Fair lot that maidens choose,

Thy mother's tenderest words are said,

Thy face no more she views;

Thy mother's lot, my dear,

She doth in naught accuse;

Her lot to bear, to nurse, to rear,

To love, and then to lose.

SEVEN TIMES SEVEN.-LONGING FOR HOME

A SONG of a boat:

There was once a boat on a billow:

Lightly she rocked to her port remote,

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And the foam was white in her wake like snow,

And her frail mast bowed when the breeze would blow, And bent like a wand of willow.

I shaded mine eyes one day when a boat
Went curtsying over the billow,

I marked her course till a dancing mote,

She faded out on the moonlit foam,

And I stayed behind in the dear-loved home;
And my thoughts all day were about the boat,
And my dreams upon the pillow.

I pray you hear my song of a boat
For it is but short:-

My boat you shall find none fairer afloat,

In river or port.

Long I looked out for the lad she bore,

On the open desolate sea,

And I think he sailed to the heavenly shore,

For he came not back to me

A song of a nest:

There was once a nest in a hollow:

Ah me!

Down in the mosses and knot-grass pressed,
Soft and warm and full to the brim-

Vetches leaned over it purple, and dim,

With buttercup buds to follow.

I pray you hear my song of a nest,

For it is not long:

You shall never light in a summer quest

The bushes among

Shall never light on a prouder sitter,

A fairer nestful, nor ever know

A softer sound than their tender twitter,
That wind-like did come and go.

I had a nestful once of my own,

Ah, happy, happy I!

Right dearly I loved them; but when they were grown They spread out their wings to fly

Songs of Seven

Oh, one after one they flew away

Far up to the heavenly blue,
To the better country, the upper day,
And I wish I was going too.

I pray you what is the nest to me,
My empty nest?

And what is the shore where I stood to see
My boat sail down to the west?

Can I call that home where I anchor yet,
Though my good man has sailed?

Can I call that home where my nest was set,
Now all its hope hath failed?

Nay, but the port where my sailor went,
And the land where my nestlings be:

There is the home where my thoughts are sent,

The only home for me—

Ah me!

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Jean Ingelow [1820-1897]

LOOKING BACKWARD

THE RETREAT

HAPPY those early days, when I
Shined in my Angel-infancy!
Before I understood this place
Appointed for my second race,
Or taught my soul to fancy aught
But a white, celestial thought;
When yet I had not walked above
A mile or two from my first Love,
And looking back, at that short space,
Could see a glimpse of His bright face;
When on some gilded cloud or flower
My gazing soul would dwell an hour,
And in those weaker glories spy
Some shadows of eternity;

Before I taught my tongue to wound
My Conscience with a sinful sound,
Or had the black art to dispense
A several sin to every sense;

But felt through all this fleshly dress
Bright shoots of everlastingness.

O how I long to travel back,

And tread again that ancient track!
That I might once more reach that plain
Where first I left my glorious train;
From whence the enlightened spirit sees
That shady City of Palm-trees.
But ah! my soul with too much stay
Is drunk, and staggers in the way!
Some men a forward motion love,
But I by backward steps would move;
And, when this dust falls to the urn,

In that state I came, return.

Henry Vaughan [1622-1695]