“A King sang once
Long years ago ’My soul is athirst for God,
Yea for the living God’—­thy thirst and his
Are one.  It is thy Poet whom thy hands
Grope for, not knowing.  Life is not enough,
Nor love, nor learning,—­Death is not enough
Even to them, happy, who forecast new life;
But give us now and satisfy us now,
Give us now, now, to live in the life of God,
Give us now, now, to be at one with Him.”

Would I had words—­I have not words for her,
Only for thee; and thus I tell them out: 
For every man the world is made afresh;
To God both it and he are young.  There are
Who call upon Him night, and morn, and night
“Where is the kingdom?  Give it us to-day. 
We would be here with God, not there with God. 
Make Thine abode with us, great Wayfarer,
And let our souls sink deeper into Thee”—­
There are who send but yearnings forth, in quest
They know not why, of good they know not what.

The unknown life, and strange its stirring is. 
The babe knows nought of life, yet clothed in it
And yearning only for its mother’s breast
Feeds thus the unheeded thing—­and as for thee,
That life thou hast is hidden from thine eyes,
And when it yearns, thou, knowing not for what,
Wouldst fain appease it with one grand, deep joy,
One draught of passionate peace—­but wilt thou know
The other name of joy, the better name
Of peace?  It is thy Father’s name.  Thy life
Yearns to its Source.  The spirit thirsts for God,
Even the living God.

But “No,” thou sayest,
“My heart is all in ruins with pain, my feet
Tread a dry desert where there is no way
Nor water.  I look back, and deep through time
The old words come but faintly up the track
Trod by the sons of men.  The man He sent,
The Prince of life, methinks I could have loved
If I had looked once in His deep man’s eyes. 
But long ago He died, and long ago
Is gone.”

He is not dead, He cannot go. 
Men’s faith at first was like a mastering stream,
Like Jordan “the descender” leaping down
Pure from his snow; and warmed of tropic heat
Hiding himself in verdure:  then at last
In a Dead Sea absorbed, as faith of doubt. 
But yet the snow lies thick on Hermon’s breast
And daily at his source the stream is born. 
Go up—­go mark the whiteness of the snow—­Thy
faith is not thy Saviour, not thy God,
Though faith waste fruitless down a desert old. 
The living God is new, and He is near.

What need to look behind thee and to sigh? 
When God left speaking He went on before
To draw men after, following up and on;
And thy heart fails because thy feet are slow;
Thou think’st of Him as one that will not wait,
A Father and not wait!—­He waited long
For us, and yet perchance He thinks not long
And will not count the time.  There are no dates
In His fine leisure.