Prayer. HEN prayer delights thee least, then learn to say, Crooked and warped I am, and I would fain Oh come, warm sun, and ripen my late fruits; Pierce, genial showers, down to my parched roots. My well is bitter; cast therein the tree, Say what is prayer, when it is prayer indeed? The man is praying, who doth press with might White heat the iron in the furnace won, Withdrawn from thence, 'twas cold and hard anon. Flowers from their stalks divided, presently The greenest leaf divided from its stem, The largest river from its fountain head Cut off, leaves soon a parched and dusty bed. All things that live from God their sustenance wait, And sun and moon are beggars at His gate. All skirts extended of thy mantle hold, When angel hands from heaven are scattering gold. LITTLE cloud was fashioned In a summer hour, All day it basked in sunlight, Once when dawn was leading On the bright sky's bosom, Like a dew-drop pale On a blue-bell blossom. So close under heaven By some angel's feet, When the breezes parted Its veiling screen, And blue glimpses darted Into sight between. As I gazed came breathings Oh, it came down-streaming Like rills roused from dreaming, It made me glad and bright, Then the sun's noon-splendour Yet intensest white; And the wanderer weary Joyed that it was made, For it gave to him a cheery And a grateful shade. Did the semblance of a shadow On the wide sky pass? And the glistening grass; It deepened on the mountain, Still though earth was shaded, And a gloom was there, Never dulled or faded Was the cloudlet fair; For it ever sailed Up so close to heaven, That nothing could have failed Of the beauty given. Now a lustre glowing In the silent west, As he turned to rest; And the cloud borne sunward, Ever floated onward All its being belted With a glory bright, While into heaven it melted In a dream of light. Never more glance crossed it In the sky-heart far, But where I had lost it Shone the evening star. Like the cloud, keep union So all love and graces, And from thee will shower, Like the shade and sound, If trouble and sadness Be around, above, Thou wilt drink deep gladness From thy heaven of love; As when earth was covered With a twilight shroud, Richer radiance hovered Round the little cloud. And when life is ending, As its beauties are, The Ivy. HE ivy in a dungeon grew, Cave moistures foul and odours dank. But through the dungeon grating high, The ivy felt a tremor shoot It grew, it crept, it pushed, it clomb, Its clinging roots grew deep and strong; It reached the beam-it thrilled, it curled, It blessed the warmth that cheers the world; It rose towards the dungeon bars It looked upon the sun and stars. It felt the life of bursting spring, It heard the happy skylark sing; It caught the breath of morns and eves, And woo'd the swallow to its leaves. By rains, and dews, and sunshine fed, Upon that solitary place Its verdure threw adorning grace, Would'st know the moral of this rhyme? In every dungeon comes a ray The ray is Truth. O soul, aspire So shalt thou quit the glooms of clay, |