HOW shall she know the worship we would do her? | |
| The walls are high and she is very far. | |
| How shall the women’s message reach unto her | |
| Above the tumult of the packed bazaar? | |
| Free wind of March, against the lattice blowing, | 5 |
| Bear thou our thanks lest she depart unknowing. | |
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| Go forth across the fields we may not roam in, | |
| Go forth beyond the trees that rim the city | |
| To whatsoe’er fair place she hath her home in, | |
| Who dowered us with wealth of love and pity. | 10 |
| Out of our shadow pass and seek her singing— | |
| “I have no gifts but Love alone for bringing.” | |
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| Say that we be a feeble folk who greet her, | |
| But old in grief, and very wise in tears: | |
| Say that we, being desolate, entreat her | 15 |
| That she forget us not in after-years; | |
| For we have seen the light and it were grievous | |
| To dim that dawning if our Lady leave us. | |
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| By Life that ebbed with none to staunch the failing, | |
| By Love’s sad harvest garnered ere the spring, | 20 |
| When Love in Ignorance wept unavailing | |
| O’er young buds dead before their blossoming; | |
| By all the grey owl watched, the pale moon viewed, | |
| In past grim years declare our gratitude! | |
| |
| By hands uplifted to the Gods that heard not, | 25 |
| By gifts that found no favour in their sight, | |
| By faces bent above the babe that stirred not, | |
| By nameless horrors of the stifling night; | |
| By ills fordone, by peace her toils discover, | |
| Bid Earth be good beneath and Heaven above her! | 30 |
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| If she have sent her servants in our pain, | |
| If she have fought with Death and dulled his sword; | |
| If she have given back our sick again, | |
| And to the breast the weakling lips restored, | |
| Is it a little thing that she has wrought? | 35 |
| Then Life and Death and Motherhood be nought. | |
| |
| Go forth, O Wind, our message on thy wings, | |
| And they shall hear thee pass and bid thee speed, | |
| In reed-roofed hut, or white-walled home of kings, | |
| Who have been holpen by her in their need. | 40 |
| All spring shall give thee fragrance, and the wheat | |
| Shall be a tasselled floorcloth to thy feet. | |
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| Haste, for our hearts are with thee, take no rest! | |
| Loud-voiced ambassador, from sea to sea | |
| Proclaim the blessing, manifold, confest, | 45 |
| Of those in darkness by her hand set free, | |
| Then very softly to her presence move, | |
| And whisper: “Lady, lo, they know and love!” | |
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