Beautiful Wands. Such beautiful, beautiful hands! That they were fair at all. I've looked on hands whose form and hue A sculptor's dream might be, Yet are those aged wrinkled hands Such beautiful, beautiful hands! Though the heart was weary and sad, I think how these hands rested not Such beautiful, beautiful hands! But oh, beyond this shadow-lamp, I know full well these dear old hands Will palms of victory bear. Where crystal streams, through endless years, Flow over golden sands, And where the old grow young again, I'll clasp my mother's hands. Ellen H. M. Gates. Homeward. They sat in peace in the sunshine, He folded their hands together; Perhaps in that miracle-country They will give her lost youth back, One draught from the living waters Shall call back his manhood's prime, And eternal years shall measure But the shapes that they left behind them Made holy to us by the kisses The angels hold printed there — We will hide away 'neath the willows, And we'll suffer no telltale tombstone, In the Father's house in the skies. Louise Chandler Moulton. Waiting. She waited for the summons; lengthening days We followed, gleaning: all the night We heard her voice thank God, in cheerful praise, Then there was silence, and we found at dawn The Old Man's Funeral, I saw an aged man upon his bier; His hair was thin and white, and on his brow A record of the cares of many a year, Cares that were ended and forgotten now. And there was sadness round, and faces bowed, Then rose another hoary man, and said, In faltering accents to that weeping train: "Ye sigh not when the sun, his course fulfilled, His glorious course, rejoicing earth and sky, In the soft evening, when the winds are stilled, Sinks where his islands of refreshment lie, And leaves the smile of his departure spread O'er the warm-colored heaven and ruddy mountain-head. "Why weep ye then for him, who, having won While the soft memory of his virtues yet Lingers, like twilight hues when the bright sun is set. "His youth was innocent; his riper age Marked with some act of goodness every day; And watched by eyes that loved him, calm and sage, Faded his late declining years away : Meekly he gave his being up and went To share the holy rest that waits a life well spent. "That life was happy; every day he gave Thanks for the fair existence that was his; For a sick fancy made him not her slave, To mock him with her phantom miseries. No chronic tortures racked his aged limbs, "And I am glad that he has lived thus long, Softly to disengage the vital cord; For when his hand grew palsied, and his eye Dark with the mists of age, it was his time to die." The Home-Seeker. I. Twilight falls a tiny maiden Tired of wandering and of playing, Up the dim street see her come! |