- 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