On her forehead of stone they laid it fair; Over her eyes that gazed too much With a tender touch they closed up well The sweet thin lips that had secrets to tell; About her brows and beautiful face They tied her veil and her marriage lace, And drew on her white feet her white silk shoes | 317 He and she; still she did not move To any one passionate whisper of love. Then he said: "Cold lips and breasts without breath, Is there no voice, no language of death? "Dumb to the ear and still to the sense, But to heart and to soul distinct, intense? What was the secret of dying, dear? now; I will listen with soul, not ear; 66 See "Did life roll back its records, dear, Which were the whitest no eye could And show, as they say it does, past choose And over her bosom they crossed her hands. "Come away!" they said; "God understands." things clear? 66 And there was silence, and nothing there O perfect dead! O dead most dear, And jasmine, and roses, and rosemary; lies she." With a shudder, to glance at its stillness and gloom. But he who loved her too well to dread "I listen as deep as to horrible hell, As high as to heaven, and you do not tell. "There must be pleasure in dying, sweet, To make you so placid from head to feet! "I would tell you, darling, if I were dead, And 't were your hot tears upon my brow shed; The sweet, the stately, the beautiful "I would say, though the Angel of Death dead, He lit his lamp and took the key He and she; but she would not speak, Though he kissed, in the old place, the quiet cheek. He and she; yet she would not smile, Though he called her the name she loved erewhile. had laid His sword on my lips to keep it unsaid. "You should not ask vainly, with streaming eyes, Which of all deaths was the chiefest surprise, "The very strangest and suddenest thing Of all the surprises that dying must bring." "The utmost wonder is this, - I hear That treasure of his treasury, And see you, and love you, and kiss While the man whom ye call dead, you, dear; In unspoken bliss, instead, In enlarging paradise, Lives a life that never dies. Farewell, friends! Yet not farewell; A moment's time, a little space. Be ye certain all seems love, Thou love divine! Thou love alway! We sat apart, but still were near It was wrought for the eye of God, and Who seek through stronger love to God A nobler love to brother. How deep the common silence was; How pure and sweet those woman faces, Which patience, gentleness, and peace Had stamped with heavenly graces. Nonoise of prayer came through the hush, No praise sang through the portals lowly, Save merry bird-songs from without, Then daily toil was glorified, And love was something rarer, finer; The whole earth, sanctified througk Christ, And human life, diviner. And when at length, by lips of age, Then at the elder's clasp of hand We rose and met beneath the portal; Some earthly dust our lives had lost, And something gained immortal. Since then, when sermon, psalm, and rite, And solemn organ's tuneful pealing, Be narrow! -as the bud, the flame, the dart; Think what God doth for man; so mayst But narrow in thy aim, not at thy heart. thou know How godlike service is, and serve also. DESPAIR. The shadow of a slave who turns his back On the light, and cries, "The universe is black!" WEALTH. Cornelia's jewels; blind old Milton's thought; Job's patience; and the lesson Lazarus taught. |