It Gave Me Reasons To Write

It Gave Me Reasons To Write

As you attune to my heart
Uplifted are my feelings
Connecting with affections
Here upon my heartstrings

Sensually flows the rhythm
With passionate desires
As our heartbeats in tempo
The sounds of love inspires

Again your heartsongs play
As words whisper amore
Embracing in your passion
I shall love you forevermore

When my heart sings of joy
Words flow with delight
Expressing my love to you
It gave me reasons to write

Fool I was to sleep at noon,
And wake when night is chilly
Beneath the comfortless cold moon;
A fool to pluck my rose too soon,
A fool to snap my lily.

My garden-plot I have not kept;
Faded and all-forsaken,
I weep as I have never wept:
Oh it was summer when I slept,
It's winter now I waken.

Talk what you please of future spring
And sun-warm'd sweet to-morrow:--
Stripp'd bare of hope and everything,
No more to laugh, no more to sing,
I sit alone with sorrow.

How many seconds in a minute?
Sixty, and no more in it.

How many minutes in an hour?
Sixty for sun and shower.

How many hours in a day?
Twenty-four for work and play.

How many days in a week?
Seven both to hear and speak.

How many weeks in a month?
Four, as the swift moon runn'th.

How many months in a year?
Twelve the almanack makes clear.

How many years in an age?
One hundred says the sage.

How many ages in time?
No one knows the rhyme.

I
She gave up beauty in her tender youth,
Gave all her hope and joy and pleasant ways;
She covered up her eyes lest they should gaze
On vanity, and chose the bitter truth.
Harsh towards herself, towards others full of ruth,
Servant of servants, little known to praise,
Long prayers and fasts trenched on her nights and days:
She schooled herself to sights and sounds uncouth
That with the poor and stricken she might make
A home, until the least of all sufficed
Her wants; her own self learned she to forsake,
Counting all earthly gain but hurt and loss.
So with calm will she chose and bore the cross
And hated all for love of Jesus Christ.

II
They knelt in silent anguish by her bed,
And could not weep; but calmly there she lay.
All pain had left her; and the sun's last ray
Shone through upon her; warming into red
The shady curtains. In her heart she said:
'Heaven opens; I leave these and go away;
The Bridegroom calls,--shall the Bride seek to stay?'
Then low upon her breast she bowed her head.
O lily flower, O gem of priceless worth,
O dove with patient voice and patient eyes,
O fruitful vine amid a land of dearth,
O maid replete with loving purities,
Thou bowedst down thy head with friends on earth
To raise it with the saints in Paradise.

"There's a footstep coming; look out and see."
"The leaves are falling, the wind is calling;
No one cometh across the lea."-

"There's a footstep coming; O sister, look."—
"The ripple flashes, the white foam dashes;
No one cometh across the brook."—

"But he promised that he would come:
Tonight, tomorrow, in joy or sorrow,
He must keep his word, and must come home.

"For he promised that he would come:
His word was given; from earth or heaven,
He must keep his word, and must come home.

"Go to sleep, my sweet sister Jane;
You can slumber, who need not number
Hour after hour, in doubt and pain.

"I shall sit here awhile, and watch;
Listening, hoping, for one hand groping
In deep shadow to find the latch."

After the dark, and before the light,
One lay sleeping; and one sat weeping,
Who had watched and wept the weary night.

After the night, and before the day,
One lay sleeping; and one sat weeping -
Watching, weeping for one away.

There came a footstep climbing the stair;
Some one standing out on the landing
Shook the door like a puff of air-

Shook the door and in he passed.
Did he enter? In the room centre
Stood her husband: the door shut fast.

"O Robin, but you are cold—
Chilled with the night-dew: so lily-white you
Look like a stray lamb from our fold.

"O Robin, but you are late:
Come and sit near me-sit here and cheer me."
(Blue the flame burnt in the grate.)

"Lay not down your head on my breast:
I cannot hold you, kind wife, nor fold you
In the shelter that you love best.

"Feel not after my clasping hand:
I am but a shadow, come from the meadow
Where many lie, but no tree can stand.

"We are trees which have shed their leaves:
Our heads lie low there, but no tears flow there;
Only I grieve for my wife who grieves.

"I could rest if you would not moan
Hour after hour; I have no power
To shut my ears where I lie alone.

"I could rest if you would not cry;
But there's no sleeping while you sit weeping-
Watching, weeping so bitterly."—

"Woe's me! woe's me! for this I have heard.
Oh night of sorrow!-oh black tomorrow!
Is it thus that you keep your word?

"O you who used so to shelter me
Warm from the least wind-why, now tlie east wind
Is warmer than you, whom I quake to see.

"O my husband offlesh and blood,
For whom my mother I left, and brother,
And all I had, accounting it good,

"What do you do there, underground,
In the dark hollow? I'm fain to follow.
What do you do there? — what have you found?"—

"What I do there I must not tell:
But I have plenty: kind wife, content ye:
It is well with us — it is well.

"Tender hand hath made our nest;
Our fear is ended, our hope is blended
With present pleasure, and we have rest."-

"Oh but Robin, I'm fain to come,
If your present days are so pleasant;
For my days are so wearisome.

"Yet I'll dry my tears for your sake:
Why should I tease you, who cannot please you
Any more with the pains I take?"