- It seems a cataract poured down from the great sky; It seems a
tenderness so vast no bush but shows Its haunting
and transfiguring light where wonder glows. It wraps us in a silken
snare
by shadowy streams, And wildering sweet and stung with joy your white
soul seems A flame, a flame, conquering day, conquering night, Brought
from our God, a holy thing, a mad delight. But love, when all things
beat
it down, leaves the wide air, The heavens are gray, and men turn
wolves, lean with despair. Ah, when we need love most, and weep, when
all is dark, Love is a pinch of ashes gray, with one
live spark-- Yet on the hope to keep alive that treasure strange Hangs
all earth's struggle,
strife and scorn, and desperate change. IV Love?... we will scarcely
love our babes full many a time-- Knowing their souls and ours too
well, and all our grime-- And there beside our holy hearth we'll hide
our eyes-- Lest
we should flash what seems disdain without disguise. Yet there shall
be no wavering there in that
deep trial-- And no false fire or stranger hand
or traitor vile-- We'll fight the gloom and fight the world with
strong sword-play, Entrenched within our block-house small, ever at
bay-- As fellow-warriors, underpaid, wounded and wild, True to their
battered flag, their faith still undefiled! Darling Daughter of
Babylon Too soon you wearied
of our tears. And then you danced with spangled feet, Leading
Belshazzar's chatt