| |
I WITH cassock black, baret and book, | |
| Father Saran goes by; | |
| I think he goes to say a prayer | |
| For one who has to die. | |
| |
| Even so, some day, Father Saran | 5 |
| May say a prayer for me; | |
| Myself meanwhile, the Sister tells, | |
| Should pray unceasingly. | |
| |
| They kneel who pray: how may I kneel | |
| Who face to ceiling lie, | 10 |
| Shut out by all that man has made | |
| From God who made the sky? | |
| |
| They lift who pray—the low earth-born— | |
| A humble heart to God: | |
| But O, my heart of clay is proud— | 15 |
| True sister to the sod. | |
| |
| I look into the face of God, | |
| They say bends over me; | |
| I search the dark, dark face of God— | |
| O what is it I see? | 20 |
| |
| I see—who lie fast bound, who may | |
| Not kneel, who can but seek— | |
| I see mine own face over me, | |
| With tears upon its cheek. | |
| |
II If my dark grandam had but known, | 25 |
| Or yet my wild grandsir, | |
| Or the lord that lured the maid away | |
| That was my sad mother, | |
| |
| O had they known, O had they dreamed | |
| What gift it was they gave, | 30 |
| Would they have stayed their wild, wild love, | |
| Nor made my years their slave? | |
| |
| Must they have stopped their hungry lips | |
| From love at thought of me? | |
| O life, O life, how may we learn | 35 |
| Thy strangest mystery? | |
| |
| Nay, they knew not, as we scarce know: | |
| Their souls, O let them rest; | |
| My life is pupil unto pain— | |
| With him I make my quest. | 40 |
| |
III My little soul I never saw, | |
| Nor can I count its days; | |
| I do not know its wondrous law | |
| And yet I know its ways. | |
| |
| O it is young as morning-hours, | 45 |
| And old as is the night; | |
| O it has growth of budding flowers, | |
| Yet tastes my body’s blight. | |
| |
| And it is silent and apart, | |
| And far and fair and still, | 50 |
| Yet ever beats within my heart, | |
| And cries within my will. | |
| |
| And it is light and bright and strange, | |
| And sees life far away, | |
| Yet far with near can interchange | 55 |
| And dwell within the day. | |
| |
| My soul has died a thousand deaths, | |
| And yet it does not die; | |
| My soul has broke a thousand faiths, | |
| And yet it cannot lie; | 60 |
| |
| My soul—there’s naught can make it less; | |
| My soul—there’s naught can mar; | |
| Yet here it weeps with loneliness | |
| Within its lonely star. | |
| |
| My soul—not any dark can bind, | 65 |
| Nor hinder any hand, | |
| Yet here it weeps—long blind, long blind— | |
| And cannot understand. | |
| |
