There seems a shadow on the day, Alone unto our Father's will One thought hath reconciled; Fold her, O Father! in thine arms, Our human hearts and thee. Still let her mild rebuking stand And her dear memory serve to make And grant that she, who, trembling here, Distrusted all her powers, May welcome to her holier home The well-beloved of ours. We Watched Her Breathing. J. G. Whittier We watched her breathing through the night, Her breathing soft and low, As in her breast the wave of life Kept heaving to and fro. For when the morn came dim and sad, And chill with early showers, Another morn than ours. Thomas Hood. The Lent Jewels. In schools of wisdom all the day was spent ; "Some years ago a friend into my care "What question can be here? Your own true heart That may be claimed again which was but lent, And should be yielded without discontent; Nor surely can we find herein a wrong, That it was left us to enjoy it long." "Good is the word," she answered. "May we now And evermore that it is good allow !" And rising, to an inner chamber led, And there she showed him, stretched upon one bed, Resignation. R. C. Trench. There is no flock, however watched and tended, But one dead lamb is there! There is no fireside, howsoe'er defended, But has one vacant chair! The air is full of farewells to the dying, And mournings for the dead; The heart of Rachel, for her children crying, Let us be patient! These severe afflictions But oftentimes celestial benedictions Assume this dark disguise. We see but dimly through the mists and vapors; Amid these earthly damps, What seem to us but sad, funereal tapers May be heaven's distant lamps. There is no Death! What seems so is transition; This life of mortal breath Is but a suburb of the life elysian, Whose portal we call Death. She is not dead, — the child of our affection,——— But gone unto that school Where she no longer needs our poor protection, In that great cloister's stillness and seclusion, Safe from temptation, safe from sin's pollution, Day after day, we think what she is doing In those bright realms of air; Year after year, her tender steps pursuing, Thus do we walk with her, and keep unbroken The bond which nature gives, Thinking that our remembrance, though unspoken, Not as a child shall we again behold her; For, when with raptures wild In our embraces we again enfold her, She will not be a child, But a fair maiden, in her Father's mansion, And beautiful with all the soul's expansion And though, at times, impetuous with emotion The swelling heart heaves, moaning like the ocean We will be patient, and assuage the feeling We may not wholly stay; By silence sanctifying, not concealing, The grief that must have way. H. W. Longfellow. Vesta. O Christ of God! whose life and death Our own have reconciled, Most quietly, most tenderly, Thy grace is in her patient eyes, Her smile is as a listening child's She leans from out our clinging arms To rest herself in thine; Alone to thee, dear Lord, can we Oh, less for her than for ourselves J. G. Whittier. Lifted Over. As tender mothers guiding baby steps, H. H. |