“If the Celestials daily fly
With messages on missions high,
And float, our masts and turrets nigh,
  Conversing on Heaven’s great intents;
What wonder hints of coming things,
Whereto man’s hope and yearning clings,
Should drop like feathers from their wings
  And give us vague presentiments?

“And as the waxing moon can take
The tidal waters in her wake,
And lead them round and round to break
  Obedient to her drawings dim;
So may the movements of His mind,
The first Great Father of mankind,
Affect with answering movements blind,
  And draw the souls that breathe by Him.

“We had a message long ago
That like a river peace should flow,
And Eden bloom again below. 
  We heard, and we began to wait: 
Full soon that message men forgot;
Yet waiting is their destined lot,
And waiting for they know not what
  They strive with yearnings passionate.

“Regret and faith alike enchain;
There was a loss, there comes a gain;
We stand at fault betwixt the twain,
  And that is veiled for which we pant. 
Our lives are short, our ten times seven;
We think the councils held in heaven
Sit long, ere yet that blissful leaven
  Work peace amongst the militant.

“Then we blame God that sin should be;
Adam began it at the tree,
’The woman whom THOU gavest me;
  And we adopt his dark device. 
O long Thou tarriest! come and reign,
And bring forgiveness in Thy train,
And give us in our hands again
  The apples of Thy Paradise.”

“Far-seeing heart! if that be all
The happy things that did not fall,”
I sighed, “from every coppice call
  They never from that garden went. 
Behold their joy, so comfort thee,
Behold the blossom and the bee,
For they are yet as good and free
  As when poor Eve was innocent

“But reason thus:  ’If we sank low,
If the lost garden we forego,
Each in his day, nor ever know
  But in our poet souls its face;
Yet we may rise until we reach
A height untold of in its speech—­
A lesson that it could not teach
  Learn in this darker dwelling-place.

“And reason on:  ’We take the spoil;
Loss made us poets, and the soil
Taught us great patience in our toil,
  And life is kin to God through death. 
Christ were not One with us but so,
And if bereft of Him we go;
Dearer the heavenly mansions grow,
  HIS home, to man that wandereth.’

“Content thee so, and ease thy smart.” 
With that she slept again, my heart,
And I admired and took my part
  With crowds of happy things the while: 
With open velvet butterflies
That swung and spread their peacock eyes,
As if they cared no more to rise
  From off their beds of camomile.

The blackcaps in an orchard met,
Praising the berries while they ate: 
The finch that flew her beak to whet
  Before she joined them on the tree;
The water mouse among the reeds—­
His bright eyes glancing black as beads,
So happy with a bunch of seeds—­
  I felt their gladness heartily.