For angels wait on Providence,
And mark the sundered places,
To graft with gentlest instrument
The heavenly graces.
I would choose to have my past as it is,
And to let my future come as it will!
Wert thou an untried dweller in the sky?
Is there betwixt the cherub that thou wert,
The cherub and the angel thou mayst be,
A life's probation in this sadder world?
Art thou with memory of two things only,
Music and light, left upon earth astray,
And, by the watchers at the gate of heaven,
Looked for with fear and trembling?
O Baby, dainty Baby Bell,
How fair she grew from day to day!
What woman nature filled her eyes,
What poetry within them lay, —
Those deep and tender twilight eyes,
So full of meaning pure and bright,
As if she yet stood in the light
Of those oped gates of Paradise.