Prophetic Moments

As when one wandering in a wood by night,
Hearing the owls cry down the dark for prey,
Seeing no star to Ught him on his way,
In those dread moments feels the entire might
Of some great, distant grief his whole soul smite
With sickening apprehension of a day,
The fruit of years unborn, till waste and gray
His far life looks in the soul's prophetic sight;

So sometimes, through the horror of my days.
The sights and sounds of ghostly memories,
I stray; but the mysterious sadness through
My soul is reached by breaths of some high peace;
Airs from a fair far land I never knew, —
A land wherein she walks with Love, and prays.