52

HERE AM I.

But not the path to that abode;

For God, through ways they have not known,
Will lead His own.

HERE AM I.

"ALLAH, Allah!" cried the sick man,
Racked with pain the long night through;
Till with prayer his heart grew tender,
Till his lips like honey grew.

But at morning came the Tempter;
Said, "Call louder, child of Pain!
See if Allah ever hear, or answers,
'Here I am!' again."

Like a stab the cruel cavil

Through his brain and pulses went;

To his heart an icy coldness,

And his brain a darkness sent.

Then before him stood Elias;

Says, "My child, why thus dismayed?

Dost repent thy former fervor?

Is thy soul of prayer afraid?”

DIFFERENT PATHS.

"Ah!" he cried, "I've called so often;
Never heard the 'Here am I,'
And I thought God will not pity,
Will not turn on me His eye."

Then the grave Elias answered,
"God said, 'Rise, Elias! go
Speak to him, the sorely tempted;
Lift him from his gulf of woe.

“Tell him that his very longing
Is itself an answering cry;

That his prayer, "Come gracious Allah!"
Is my answer, "Here am I!",

"Every inmost aspiration

Is God's angel, undefiled;

And in every 'O my Father!'
Slumbers deep a 'Here, my child!'”

DIFFERENT PATHS.

I LATELY talked with one who strove
To show that all my way was dim,
That his alone the road to heaven;
And thus it was I answered him :

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54

DIFFERENT PATHS.

"Strike not away the staff I hold,

You cannot give me yours, dear friend! Up the steep hill our paths are set,

In different ways, to one sure end.

"What though with eagle glance upfixed
On heights beyond our mortal ken,
You tread the broad, sure stones of Faith
More firmly than do weaker men;

"To each according to his strength;
But as we leave the plains below,
Let us carve out a wider stair,

And broader pathway through the snow.

"And when upon the golden crest
We stand at last together, freed

From mists that circle round the base,
And clouds that but obscure our creed,

"We shall perceive that, though our steps Have wandered wide apart, dear friend,

No pathway can be wholly wrong

That tends unto one perfect end."

Thought is deeper than all speech,
Feeling deeper than all thought;
Souls to souls can never teach
What unto themselves was taught.

We are spirits clad in veils;
Man by man was never seen;
All our deep communing fails
To remove the shadowy screen.

Heart to heart was never known;
Mind with mind did never meet;

We are columns left alone

Of a temple once complete.

Like the stars that gem the sky,
Far apart though seeming near,

In our light we scattered lie;

All is thus but starlight here.

What is social company

But a babbling summer stream?

What our wise philosophy

But the glancing of a dream?

56

THE WILD ROSE BY THE RAILROAD.

Only when the sun of love

Melts the scattered stars of thought,
Only when we live above

What the dim-eyed world hath taught,

Only when our souls are fed

By the fount which gave them birth,
And by inspiration led

Which they never drew from earth,

We, like parted drops of rain,
Swelling till they meet and run,

Shall be all absorbed again,

Melting, flowing into one.

CRANCH

THE WILD ROSE BY THE RAILROAD.

On its straight iron pathway the long train was rush

ing,

With its noise and its smoke and its great human

load;

And I saw where a wild rose in beauty was blushing,

Fresh and sweet, by the side of the hot, dusty road.

Untrained were its branches, untended it flourished;

No eye marked its budding, or mourned its decay;