ing:
The poor die mute--with starving gaze
On corn-ships in the offing.
Be pitiful, O God!

We meet together at the feast--
To private mirth betake us--
We stare down in the winecup lest
Some vacant chair should shake us!
We name delight, and pledge it round--
"It shall be ours to-morrow!"
God's seraphs, do your voices sound
As sad in naming sorrow?
Be pitiful, O God!

We sit together, with the skies,
The steadfast skies, above us:
We look into each other's eyes,
"And how long will you love us?"
The eyes grow dim with prophecy,
The voice is low and breathless--
"Till death us part!"--O words, to be
Our _best_ for love the deathless!
Be pitiful, dear God!

We tremble by the harmless bed
Of one loved and departed--
Our tears drop on the lids that said
Last night, "Be stronger hearted!"
O God,--to clasp those fingers close,
And yet to feel so lonely!--
To see a light upon such brows,
Which is the daylight only!
Be pitiful, O God!

The happy children come to us,
And look up in our faces:
They ask us--Was it thus, and thus,
When we were in their places?
We cannot speak:--we see anew
The hills we used to live in;
And feel our mother's smile press through
The kisses she is giving.
Be pitiful, O God!

We pray together at the kirk,
For mercy, mercy, solely--
Hands weary with the evil work,
We lift them to the Holy!
The corpse is calm below our knee--
Its spirit bright before thee--
Between them, worse than either, we--
Without the rest of glory!
Be pitiful, O God!

We leave the communing of men,
The murmur of the passions;
And live alone, to live again
With endless generations.
Are we so brave?--The sea and sky
In silence lift their mirrors;
And, glassed therein, our spirits high
Recoil from their own terrors.
Be pitiful, O God!

We sit on hills our childhood wist,
Woods, hamlets, streams, beholding:
The sun strikes through the farthest mist,
The city's spire to golden.
The city's golden spire it was,
When hope and health were strong;
But now it is the churchyard grass,
We look upon the longest.
Be pitiful, O God!

And soon all vision waxeth dull--
Men whisper, "He is dying":
We cry no more, "Be pitiful!"--
We have no strength