The Diary of an Old Soul | Page 6

thee.
7.
Thou near then, I draw nearer--to thy feet,
And sitting in thy shadow,
look out on the shine;
Ready at thy first word to leave my seat--
Not
thee: thou goest too. From every clod
Into thy footprint flows the
indwelling wine;
And in my daily bread, keen-eyed I greet
Its
being's heart, the very body of God.
8.
Thou wilt interpret life to me, and men,
Art, nature, yea, my own
soul's mysteries--
Bringing, truth out, clear-joyous, to my ken,
Fair
as the morn trampling the dull night. Then
The lone hill-side shall
hear exultant cries;
The joyous see me joy, the weeping weep;
The
watching smile, as Death breathes on me his cold sleep.
9.
I search my heart--I search, and find no faith.
Hidden He may be in
its many folds--
I see him not revealed in all the world
Duty's firm
shape thins to a misty wraith.
No good seems likely. To and fro I am
hurled.
I have no stay. Only obedience holds:--
I haste, I rise, I do
the thing he saith.
10.
Thou wouldst not have thy man crushed back to clay;
It must be, God,
thou hast a strength to give
To him that fain would do what thou dost
say;
Else how shall any soul repentant live,
Old griefs and new
fears hurrying on dismay?
Let pain be what thou wilt, kind and
degree,
Only in pain calm thou my heart with thee.
11.

I will not shift my ground like Moab's king,
But from this spot
whereon I stand, I pray--
>From this same barren rock to thee I say,

"Lord, in my commonness, in this very thing
That haunts my soul
with folly--through the clay
Of this my pitcher, see the lamp's dim
flake;
And hear the blow that would the pitcher break."
12.
Be thou the well by which I lie and rest;
Be thou my tree of life, my
garden ground;
Be thou my home, my fire, my chamber blest,
My
book of wisdom, loved of all the best;
Oh, be my friend, each day still
newer found,
As the eternal days and nights go round!
Nay,
nay--thou art my God, in whom all loves are bound!
13.
Two things at once, thou know'st I cannot think.
When busy with the
work thou givest me,
I cannot consciously think then of thee.
Then
why, when next thou lookest o'er the brink
Of my horizon, should my
spirit shrink,
Reproached and fearful, nor to greet thee run?
Can I
be two when I am only one.
14.
My soul must unawares have sunk awry.
Some care, poor eagerness,
ambition of work,
Some old offence that unforgiving did lurk,
Or
some self-gratulation, soft and sly--
Something not thy sweet will, not
the good part,
While the home-guard looked out, stirred up the old
murk,
And so I gloomed away from thee, my Heart.
15.
Therefore I make provision, ere I begin
To do the thing thou givest
me to do,
Praying,--Lord, wake me oftener, lest I sin.
Amidst my
work, open thine eyes on me,
That I may wake and laugh, and know

and see
Then with healed heart afresh catch up the clue,
And
singing drop into my work anew.
16.
If I should slow diverge, and listless stray
Into some thought, feeling,
or dream unright,
O Watcher, my backsliding soul affray;
Let me
not perish of the ghastly blight.
Be thou, O Life eternal, in me light;

Then merest approach of selfish or impure
Shall start me up alive,
awake, secure.
17.
Lord, I have fallen again--a human clod!
Selfish I was, and heedless
to offend;
Stood on my rights. Thy own child would not send
Away
his shreds of nothing for the whole God!
Wretched, to thee who
savest, low I bend:
Give me the power to let my rag-rights go
In the
great wind that from thy gulf doth blow.
18.
Keep me from wrath, let it seem ever so right:
My wrath will never
work thy righteousness.
Up, up the hill, to the whiter than snow-shine,

Help me to climb, and dwell in pardon's light.
I must be pure as
thou, or ever less
Than thy design of me--therefore incline
My heart
to take men's wrongs as thou tak'st mine.
19.
Lord, in thy spirit's hurricane, I pray,
Strip my soul naked--dress it
then thy way.
Change for me all my rags to cloth of gold.
Who
would not poverty for riches yield?
A hovel sell to buy a
treasure-field?
Who would a mess of porridge careful hold
Against
the universe's birthright old?
20.

Help me to yield my will, in labour even,
Nor toil on toil, greedy of
doing, heap--
Fretting I cannot more than me is given;
That with the
finest clay my wheel runs slow,
Nor lets the lovely thing the shapely
grow;
That memory what thought gives it cannot keep,
And nightly
rimes ere morn like cistus-petals go.
21.
'Tis--shall thy will be done for me?--or mine,
And I be made a thing
not after thine--
My own, and dear in paltriest details?
Shall I be
born of God, or of mere man?
Be made like Christ, or on some other
plan?--
I let all run:--set thou and trim my sails;
Home then my
course, let blow whatever gales.
22.
With