“NOW have I won a marvel and a Truth”; | |
| So spake the soul and trembled, “dread and ruth | |
| Together mixed, a sweet and bitter core | |
| Closed in one rind; for I did sin of yore, | |
| But this (so said I oft) was long ago; | 5 |
| So put it from me far away, but, lo! | |
| With Thee is neither After nor Before, | |
| O Lord, and clear within the noon-light set | |
| Of one illimitable Present, yet | |
| Thou lookest on my fault as it were now. | 10 |
| So will I mourn and humble me; yet Thou | |
| Art not as man, that oft forgives a wrong | |
| Because he half forgets it, Time being strong | |
| To wear the crimson of guilt’s stain away; | |
| For Thou, forgiving, dost so in the Day | 15 |
| That shows it clearest, in the boundless Sea | |
| Of Mercy and Atonement, utterly | |
| Casting our pardoned trespasses behind, | |
| No more remembered, or to come in mind; | |
| Set wide from us as East from West away | 20 |
| So now this bitter turns to solace kind; | |
| And I will comfort me that once of old | |
| A deadly sorrow struck me, and its cold | |
| Runs through me still; but this was long ago. | |
| My grief is dull through age, and friends outworn, | 25 |
| And wearied comforters, have long forborne | |
| To sit and weep beside me: Lord, yet Thou | |
| And look upon my pang as it were now!” | |
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