And, sitting by her, covered up his face: 
  Until a cloud, alone between the earth
  And sun, passed with its shadow over him. 
  Then Jesus for a moment looked above;
  And a few drops of rain fell on his brow,
  Sad, as with broken hints of a lost dream,
  Or dim foreboding of some future ill.

  Now, from a garden near, a fair-haired girl
  Came, carrying a handful of choice flowers,
  Which in her lap she sorted orderly,
  As little children do at Easter-time
  To have all seemly when their Lord shall rise. 
  Then Jesus’ covered face she gently raised,
  Placed in his hand the flowers, and kissed his cheek
  And tried with soothing words to comfort him;
  He from his eyes spoke thanks.

  Fast trickling down his face, drop upon drop,
  Fell to the ground.  That sad look left him not
  Till night brought sleep, and sleep closed o’er his woe.

II.  The Scourging

  Again there came a day when Mary sat
  Within the latticed doorway’s fretted shade,
  Working in bright and many colored threads
  A girdle for her child, who at her feet
  Lay with his gentle face upon her lap. 
  Both little hands were crossed and tightly clasped
  Around her knee.  On them the gleams of light
  Which broke through overhanging blossoms warm,
  And cool transparent leaves, seemed like the gems
  Which deck Our Lady’s shrine when incense-smoke
  Ascends before her, like them, dimly seen
  Behind the stream of white and slanting rays
  Which came from heaven, as a veil of light,
  Across the darkened porch, and glanced upon
  The threshold-stone; and here a moth, just born
  To new existence, stopped upon her flight,
  To bask her blue-eyed scarlet wings spread out
  Broad to the sun on Jesus’ naked foot,
  Advancing its warm glow to where the grass,
  Trimmed neatly, grew around the cottage door.

  And the child, looking in his mother’s face,
  Would join in converse upon holy things
  With her, or, lost in thought, would seem to watch
  The orange-belted wild bees when they stilled
  Their hum, to press with honey-searching trunk
  The juicy grape; or drag their waxed legs
  Half buried in some leafy cool recess
  Found in a rose; or else swing heavily
  Upon the bending woodbine’s fragrant mouth,
  And rob the flower of sweets to feed the rock,
  Where, in a hazel-covered crag aloft
  Parting two streams that fell in mist below,
  The wild bees ranged their waxen vaulted cells.

  As the time passed, an ass’s yearling colt,
  Bearing a heavy load, came down the lane
  That wound from Nazareth by Joseph’s house,
  Sloping down to the sands.  And two young men,
  The owners of the colt, with many blows
  From lash and goad wearied its patient sides;
  Urging it past its strength, so they might