I THANK all who have loved me in their hearts,
        With thanks and love from mine.  Deep thanks to all
        Who paused a little near the prison-wall,
     To hear my music in its louder parts,
     Ere they went onward, each one to the mart’s
        Or temple’s occupation, beyond call. 
        But thou, who in my voice’s sink and fall,
     When the sob took it, thy divinest Art’s
        Own instrument didst drop down at thy foot,
     To hearken what I said between my tears,
        Instruct me how to thank thee!—­Oh, to shoot
     My soul’s full meaning into future years,
        That they should lend it utterance, and salute
     Love that endures! with Life that disappears!

     How do I love thee?  Let me count the ways. 
       I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
       My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
     For the ends of Being and Ideal Grace. 
     I love thee to the level of every day’s
       Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light. 
       I love thee freely, as men strive for Right;
     I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise;
       I love thee with the passion put to use
     In my old griefs, and with my childhood’s faith;
       I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
     With my lost saints,—­I love thee with the breath,
       Smiles, tears, of all my life!—­and if God choose,
     I shall but love thee better after death.

     A FALSE STEP

     Sweet, thou hast trod on a heart. 
        Pass! there’s a world full of men;
      And women as fair as thou art
     Must do such things now and then.

     Thou only hast stepped unaware,—­
       Malice, not one can impute;
     And why should a heart have been there
       In the way of a fair woman’s foot?

     It was not a stone that could trip,
        Nor was it a thorn that could rend: 
     Put up thy proud underlip! 
       ’Twas merely the heart of a friend.

     And yet peradventure one day
       Thou, sitting alone at the glass,
     Remarking the bloom gone away,
       Where the smile in its dimplement was,

     And seeking around thee in vain
       From hundreds who flattered before,
     Such a word as,—­“Oh, not in the main
       Do I hold thee less precious,—­but more!”

     Thou’lt sigh, very like, on thy part:—­
       “Of all I have known or can know,
     I wish I had only that Heart
       I trod upon, ages ago!”

     A CHILD’S THOUGHT OF GOD

     They say that God lives very high! 
       But if you look above the pines
     You cannot see our God.  And why?

     And if you dig down in the mines
       You never see him in the gold,
     Though, from him, all that’s glory shines.