KNOCKING, knocking, ever knocking? | |
| Who is there? | |
| ’T is a pilgrim, strange and kingly, | |
| Never such was seen before;— | |
| Ah, sweet soul, for such a wonder, | 5 |
| Undo the door. | |
| No,—that door is hard to open; | |
| Hinges rusty, latch is broken; | |
| Bid Him go. | |
| Wherefore with that knocking dreary | 10 |
| Scare the sleep from one so weary? | |
| Say Him, no. | |
| |
| Knocking, knocking, ever knocking? | |
| What! Still there? | |
| O sweet soul, but once behold Him, | 15 |
| With the glory-crownèd hair; | |
| And those eyes, so strange and tender, | |
| Waiting there; | |
| Open! Open! Once behold Him, | |
| Him so fair. | 20 |
| |
| Ah, that door! Why wilt thou vex me, | |
| Coming ever to perplex me? | |
| For the key is stiffly rusty, | |
| And the bolt is clogged and dusty; | |
| Many-fingered ivy vine | 25 |
| Seals it fast with twist and twine; | |
| Weeds of years and years before | |
| Choke the passage of that door. | |
| |
| Knocking! knocking! What? Still knocking? | |
| He still there? | 30 |
| What ’s the hour? The night is waning— | |
| In my heart a drear complaining, | |
| And a chilly, sad unrest. | |
| Ah, this knocking! It disturbs me! | |
| Scares my sleep with dreams unblest! | 35 |
| Give me rest, | |
| Rest—ah, rest! | |
| |
| Rest, dear soul, He longs to give thee; | |
| Thou hast only dreamed of pleasure, | |
| Dreamed of gifts and golden treasure, | 40 |
| Dreamed of jewels in thy keeping, | |
| Waked to weariness of weeping;— | |
| Open to thy soul’s one Lover, | |
| And thy night of dreams is over,— | |
| The true gifts He brings have seeming | 45 |
| More than all thy faded dreaming! | |
| |
| Did she open? Doth she? Will she? | |
| So, as wondering we behold, | |
| Grows the picture to a sign, | |
| Pressed upon your soul and mine; | 50 |
| For in every breast that liveth | |
| Is that strange, mysterious door;— | |
| The forsaken and betangled, | |
| Ivy-gnarled and weed-bejangled, | |
| Dusty, rusty, and forgotten;— | 55 |
| There the piercèd hand still knocketh, | |
| And with ever patient watching, | |
| With the sad eyes true and tender, | |
| With the glory-crownèd hair,— | |
| Still a God is waiting there. | 60 |
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