| ‘GRAND is the leisure of the earth; | |
| She gives her happy myriads birth, | |
| And after harvest fears not dearth, | |
| But goes to sleep in snow-wreaths dim. | |
| Dread is the leisure up above | 5 |
| The while He sits whose name is Love, | |
| And waits, as Noah did, for the dove, | |
| To wit if she would fly to him. | |
| |
| ‘He waits for us, while, houseless things, | |
| We beat about with bruisèd wings | 10 |
| On the dark floods and water-springs, | |
| The ruined world, the desolate sea; | |
| With open windows from the prime | |
| All night, all day, He waits sublime, | |
| Until the fullness of the time | 15 |
| Decreed from His eternity. | |
| |
| ‘Where is OUR leisure?—Give us rest. | |
| Where is the quiet we possessed? | |
| We must have had it once—were blest | |
| With peace whose phantoms yet entice. | 20 |
| Sorely the mother of mankind | |
| Longed for the garden left behind; | |
| For we still prove some yearnings blind | |
| Inherited from Paradise.’ | |
| |
| ‘Hold, heart!’ I cried; ‘for trouble sleeps, | 25 |
| I hear no sound of aught that weeps; | |
| I will not look into thy deeps— | |
| I am afraid, I am afraid!’ | |
| ‘Afraid!’ she saith; ‘and yet ’tis true | |
| That what man dreads he still should view— | 30 |
| Should do the thing he fears to do, | |
| And storm the ghosts in ambuscade!’ | |
| |
| ‘What good!’ I sigh. ‘Was reason meant | |
| To straighten branches that are bent, | |
| Or soothe an ancient discontent, | 35 |
| The instinct of a race dethroned? | |
| Ah! doubly should that instinct go, | |
| Must the four rivers cease to flow, | |
| Nor yield those rumours sweet and low | |
| Wherewith man’s life is undertoned.’ | 40 |
| |
| ‘Yet had I but the past,’ she cries, | |
| ‘And it was lost, I would arise | |
| And comfort me some other wise. | |
| But more than loss about me clings. | |
| I am but restless with my race; | 45 |
| The whispers from a heavenly place, | |
| Once dropped among us, seem to chase | |
| Rest with their prophet-visitings. | |
| |
| ‘The race is like a child, as yet | |
| Too young for all things to be set | 50 |
| Plainly before him, with no let | |
| Or hindrance meet for his degree; | |
| But ne’ertheless by much too old | |
| Not to perceive that men withhold | |
| More of the story than is told, | 55 |
| And so infer a mystery. | |
| |
| ‘If the Celestials daily fly | |
| With messages on missions high, | |
| And float, our nests and turrets nigh, | |
| Conversing on Heaven’s great intents, | 60 |
| What wonder hints of coming things, | |
| Whereto men’s hope and yearning clings, | |
| Should drop like feathers from their wings | |
| And give us vague presentiments. | |
| |
| ‘And as the waxing moon can take | 65 |
| The tidal waters in her wake, | |
| And lead them round and round, to break | |
| Obedient to her drawings dim; | |
| So may the movements of His mind, | |
| The first Great Father of mankind, | 70 |
| Affect with answering movements blind, | |
| And draw the souls that breathe by Him. | |
| |
| ‘We had a message long ago | |
| That like a river peace should flow, | |
| And Eden bloom again below. | 75 |
| We heard, and we began to wait: | |
| Full soon that message men forgot; | |
| Yet waiting is their destined lot, | |
| And, waiting for they know not what, | |
| They strive with yearnings passionate.’ | 80 |
