| Higginson and Bigelow, comps. American Sonnets. 1891. | | | | He Was Acquainted with Grief | | By Jones Very (1813–1880) |
| | | I CANNOT tell the sorrows that I feel | |
| By the night’s darkness, by the prison’s gloom; | |
| There is no sight that can the death reveal | |
| The spirit suffers in a living tomb; | |
| There is no sound of grief that mourners raise, | 5 |
| No moaning of the wind, or dirge-like sea, | |
| Nor hymns, though prophet tones inspire the lays, | |
| That can the spirit’s grief awake in thee. | |
| Thou too must suffer, as it suffers here, | |
| The death in Christ, to know the Father’s love; | 10 |
| Then in the strains that angels love to hear | |
| Thou too shalt hear the Spirit’s song above, | |
| And learn in grief what these can never tell, | |
| A note too deep for earthly voice to swell. | | | | |
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