A Child's Death

Thou touchest us lightly, O God! in our grief;
But how rough is Thy touch in our prosperous hours!
All was bright, but Thou earnest, so dreadful and brief,
Like a thunderbolt falling in gardens of flowers.

My children! My children! they clustered all round
Like a rampart which sorrow could never break through;
Each change in their beautiful lives only bound me
In a spell of delight which no care could undo.

But the eldest! O Father! how glorious he was,
With the soul looking out through his fountain-like eyes:
Thou lovest thy Sole-born! And had I not cause
The treasure Thou gavest me, Father! to prize?

But the lily-bed lies beaten down by the rain,
And the tallest is gone from the place where he grew;
My tallest! my fairest! Oh let me complain;
For all life is unroofed, and the tempests beat through.

I murmur not, Father! My will is with Thee;
I knew at the first that my darling was Thine:
Hadst Thou taken him earlier, O Father! - - but see!
Thou hadst left him so long that I dreamed he was mine.

Thou hast taken the fairest: he was fairest to me;
Thou hast taken the fairest: tis always Thy way;
Thou hast taken the dearest: was he dearest to Thee?
Thou art welcome, thrice welcome: yet woe is the day!

Thou hast honored my child by the speed of Thy choice,
Thou hast crowned him with glory, o erwhelmed him with mirth:
He sings up in Heaven with his sweet-sounding voice,
While I, a saint's mother, am weeping on earth.

Yet oh for that voice, which is thrilling through Heaven,
One moment my ears with its music to slake!
Oh no! not for worlds would I have him re-given,
Yet I long to have back what I would not re-take.

I grudge him, and grudge him not! Father! Thou knowest
The foolish confusions of innocent sorrow;
It is thus in Thy husbandry, Saviour! Thou sowest
The grief of to-day for the grace of to-morrow.
Thou art blooming in Heaven, my Blossom, my Pride!

And thy beauty makes Jesus and Mary more glad:
Saints mothers have sung when their eldest-born died;
Oh why, my own saint! is thy mother so sad?
Go, go with thy God, with thy Saviour, my child!

Thou art His; I am His; and thy sisters are His:
But to-day thy fond mother with sorrow is wild, -
To think that her son is an angel in bliss!
Oh forgive me, dear Saviour! on Heaven's bright shore

Should I still in my child find a separate joy:
While I lie in the light of Thy Face evermore,
May I think Heaven brighter because of my boy?