Page:Songs and Sonnets (1906).djvu/144



no speech, the rose I plucked is dead,
 * Faintly is borne to me upon the wind
 * The dying laughter—I am left behind.

Once I laughed, too, tears now are mine instead! Gone are the hopes—the dreams on which I fed,
 * And memories alone remain to bind
 * My broken days and link me to my kind,

Or ease the desolate ways my feet must tread.

And yet, O God, I know not how to fail!
 * Within my heart still bums an unquenched fire,

Like Israel of old I must prevail,
 * Or failing, still reach on to something higher—
 * They counted Him a failure when He trod
 * Those slopes of Calvary that led to God!