Page:The poems of Richard Watson Gilder, Gilder, 1908.djvu/381

Rh "SHALL WE NOT PRAISE THE LIVING?"

I

!

Shall we not praise the living as the dead?

And I, who lately sang a beautiful spirit fled,

Shall I not praise a living spirit we know,

Dear heart! we know full well,

And long have known, in utmost joy and woe;

In our own sorrows, and delights;

Her days of brightness and lone-weeping nights!

If she should die, alas the day! how swift this verse would tell

Our anguish, our large loss, irreparable,

In a wild passion of praise

For her dear virtues, her sweet friendship's ways,

That many know; but only a sacred few

Know, as to the evening hour is known the dew,

As the still dawn knows the great, melting stars,

As night is intimate to those who love,

As sorrow's voice is known to the mourning dove,

As memoried twilight holds the sunset's crimson bars.

II

Shall we not praise the loveliness

God gave her, and the true heart that cannot help but bless?

For she is not of those

Who virtues wear like graceful draperies,

But breathes them as her life. Where'er she goes

Go pleasure and pure thoughts, and baseness dies.

A holy ministry her life is, even without intent;

For, tho' she worships duty,