I
Into a deed e’en then advanced, wherein
God, unidentified, was thought-of still.
II
IV
VI
Smiling those smiles, which I may not return,
Or frowning frowns of fierce triumphant malice,
As angry claimants or expectants sure
Of that I promised and may not perform,
Look me in the face! O hide me, Mother Night!
1841
IX
Which upon some sick bed are seen
To glorify a pale worn face
With sudden beauty,—so at whiles
Lights have descended, hues have been,
To clothe with half-celestial grace
The bareness of the desert place.
Since so it is, so be it still!
Could only thou, my heart, be taught
To treasure, and in act fulfil
The lesson which the sight has brought;
In thine own dull and dreary state
To work and patiently to wait:
Little thou think'st in thy despair
How soon the o'ershaded sun may shine,
And e'en the dulling clouds combine
To bless with lights and hues divine
That region desolate and bare,
Those sad and sinful thoughts of thine!
Still doth the coward heart complain;
The hour may come, and come in vain;
The branch that withered lies and dead
No suns can force to lift its head.
True!—yet how little thou canst tell
How much in thee is ill or well;
Nor for thy neighbour nor for thee,
Be sure, was life designed to be
A draught of dull complacency.
One Power too is it, who doth give
The food without us, and within
The strength that makes it nutritive:
He bids the dry bones rise and live,
And e'en in hearts depraved to sin
Some sudden, gracious influence,
May give the long-lost good again,
And wake within the dormant sense
And love of good;—for mortal men,
So but thou strive, thou soon shalt see
Defeat itself is victory.
So be it: yet, O Good and Great,
In whom in this bedarkened state
I fain am struggling to believe,
Let me not ever cease to grieve,
Nor lose the consciousness of ill
Within me;—and refusing still
To recognise in things around
What cannot truly there be found,
Let me not feel, nor be it true,
That, while each daily task I do,
I still am giving day by day
My precious things within away
(Those thou didst give to keep as thine),
And casting, do whate'er I may,
My heavenly pearls to earthly swine.
1841