“And speak’st thou thus,
Despairing of the sun that sets to thee,
And of the earthly love that wanes to thee,
And of the heaven that lieth far from thee? 
Peace, peace, fond fool!  One draweth near thy door
Whose footsteps leave no print across the snow;
Thy sun has risen with comfort in his face,
The smile of heaven, to warm thy frozen heart,
And bless with saintly hand.  What! is it long
To wait, and far to go?  Thou shalt not go;
Behold, across the snow to thee He comes,
Thy heaven descends, and is it long to wait? 
Thou shalt not wait:  ‘This night, this night,’ he saith,
‘I stand at the door and knock.’

“It is enough—­can such an one be here—­
Yea, here?  O God forgive you, fishermen! 
One! is there only one?  But do thou know,
O woman pale for want, if thou art here,
That on thy lot much thought is spent in heaven;
And, coveting the heart a hard man broke,
One standeth patient, watching in the night,
And waiting in the daytime. 
                              What shall be
If thou wilt answer?  He will smile on thee,
One smile of His shall be enough to heal
The wound of man’s neglect; and He will sigh,
Pitying the trouble which that sigh shall cure;
And He will speak—­speak in the desolate nigh
In the dark night:  ’For me a thorny crown
Men wove, and nails were driven in my hands
And feet:  there was an earthquake, and I died
I died, and am alive for evermore.

“’I died for thee; for thee I am alive,
And my humanity doth mourn for thee,
For thou art mine; and all thy little ones,
They, too, are mine, are mine.  Behold, the house
Is dark, but there is brightness where the sons
Of God are singing, and, behold, the heart
Is troubled:  yet the nations walk in white;
They have forgotten how to weep; and thou
Shalt also come, and I will foster thee
And satisfy thy soul; and thou shall warm
Thy trembling life beneath the smile of God. 
A little while—­it is a little while—­
A little while, and I will comfort thee;
I go away, but I will come again.’

“But hear me yet.  There was a poor old man
Who sat and listened to the raging sea,
And heard it thunder, lunging at the cliffs
As like to tear them down.  He lay at night;
And ‘Lord have mercy on the lads,’ said he,
’That sailed at noon, though they be none of mine! 
For when the gale gets up, and when the wind
Flings at the window, when it beats the roof,
And lulls and stops and rouses up again,
And cuts the crest clean off the plunging wave. 
And scatters it like feathers up the field,
Why, then I think of my two lads:  my lads
That would have worked and never let me want,
And never let me take the parish pay. 
No, none of mine; my lads were drowned at sea—­
My two—­before the most of these wore born. 
I know how sharp that cuts, since my poor wife