To Two Bereaved
Now in your days of worst distress,
The empty days that stretch before,
When all your sweet's turned bitterness;--
The Hand of the Lord is at your door.
And when at morn beside your bed
Grief waits to tell you it is true,
That both your darling boys are dead;
The Mercy of the Lord bends down to you.
When you are frozen and stripped bare
And over your joy is raised a stone,
The foot of the Lord is on your stair;
The Lord's mercy is never done.
More than the joys of common men,--
The gifts of the Lord are past desire--
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poem by Katharine Tynan
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The Open Road
THE roads of the Sea
Are thronged with merchantmen;
East and West, North and South
They go and come again.
All precious merchandise
They bear in their hold:
Lest the people be starving
In the night and cold.
Now tell me, good merchants,
How this thing can be
That the white ships are thronging
The roads of the sea?
For there's death in the skies
And there's death on the earth;
And men talked of famine
And a frozen hearth.
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poem by Katharine Tynan
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The Only Son
His mother died last year and yet
She wearied Heaven with fear and fret,
Wanting the son she left behind,
And God was patient, being kind.
He was so beautiful, so young,
Slender as a tall tree, wind-swung;
Innocent, gay: she went in fear
Something might hurt him, lacking her.
She heard amid the starry mirth
Rumour of dreadful things on earth.
Of sweet youth slain and beauty marred
Beyond all balm and spikenard.
Oh, had she visions of his plight
Lying in the red rain at night
Amid the piteous heap of slain,
That she was wild with fear and pain?
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poem by Katharine Tynan
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A Gardener-Sage
Here in the garden-bed,
Hoeing the celery,
Wonders the Lord has made
Pass ever before me.
I see the young birds build,
And swallows come and go,
And summer grow and gild,
And winter die in snow.
Many a thing I note,
And store it in my mind,
For all my ragged coat
That scarce will stop the wind.
I light my pipe and draw,
And, leaning on my spade,
I marvel with much awe
O'er all the Lord hath made.
Now, here's a curious thing:
Upon the first of March
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poem by Katharine Tynan
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A Colloquy: (For M. W.)
'When you get to Heaven, seek and find my boy.
Mother him!' 'Until you come?' 'I shall never come.
Earth was good enough for me who had all my joy
In my Love, my Light of home.
'But to him be given, in overflowing measure,
All the joys your Heaven can give if your God be just!
He, my boy slain in his youth to serve some mad king's pleasure
And his dreams and hopes in dust.'
'How shall I know him where so many boys are?
Multitudes and multitudes ever they increase.'
'Oh, my boy is young and tall, with bird-russet hair
And quiet eyes of peace.
'He who was killed in a quarrel not his own!
All his days he had good-will to his fellow-men.
Oh, your God is kind and just, shall He not atone
And the dark ways be made plain?
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poem by Katharine Tynan
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The Watchers
THE cottages all lie asleep;
The sheep and lambs are folded in
Winged sentinels the vale will keep
Until the hours of life begin.
The children with their prayers all said
Sleep until cockcrow shall awake
The gardens in their gold and red
And robins in the bush and brake.
The fields of harvest golden-white,
The fields of pasture rich and green,
Sleep on nor fear the kindly night,
The watching mountains set between.
The river sings its sleepy song,
Nought stirs the wakeful owl beside:
Our peace is builded sure and strong
No evil beast can creep inside.
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poem by Katharine Tynan
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The Perfect Playmate
Roger Charles Noel Bellingham. Before Ypres, March 4th, 1915
The Perfect Playmate, whither does he stray
That now no more his feet come up this way
That rang so blithe upon the nursery floor?
Wild games and laughter! Now the little son
Listens and longs, and his small world's undone.
The Perfect Playmate will return no more.
Who else made holidays of rainy days?
Who told such marvels by the firelight blaze?
King of misrule when Christmas frosts were hoar.
But now the black-gowned mother's tears will flow
Whether her little son be good or no.
The Perfect Playmate will return no more.
Who built the sands, dug deep, was never loth
Nor ever tired: was strong enough for both:
Home on his shoulders a small drowsy head bore;
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poem by Katharine Tynan
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For the Airmen
THOU who guidest the swallow and wren,
Keep the paths of the flying men!
Over the mountains, over the seas
Thou hast given the bird-folk compasses.
Thou guidest them, yea, Thou leadest them home
By the trackless ways and the venturesome.
Look Thou then on these bird-men, far
More than the sparrows and swallows are.
When they fly in the wintry weather
Be their compass and chart together.
Keep them riding the wind. Uphold
Their passion of flight lest it grow cold.
Thy right hand be under the wing,
Thy left hand for their steadying.
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poem by Katharine Tynan
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Haymaking
Aye, sure, it does always be rainin'
An' the hay lyin' out in the wet,
But what's the good o' complainin'?
It never made things better yet!
There'll be musty hay in the manger,
The cow's goin' dry, be mischance,
And the boy that went for a Ranger
Is lost on us -- somewhere in France!
The father of him, it's heart-breakin' --
Wid a watery glint o' the sun,
It's out wid him, turnin' an' shakin' --
Then all the labour's undone.
There won't be much savin' in Connaught,
The winter'll be hungry and black,
But I wouldn't waste sorrow upon it
If only the boy could come back!
There's a terrible cloud over Nephin,
An' the rain rushin' up from the say,
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poem by Katharine Tynan
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Flower of Youth
LEST Heaven be thronged with grey-beards hoary,
God, who made boys for His delight,
Stoops in a day of grief and glory
And calls them in, in from the night.
When they come trooping from the war
Our skies have many a new gold star.
Heaven's thronged with gay and careless faces,
New-waked from dreams of dreadful things,
They walk in green and pleasant places
And by the crystal water-springs
Who dreamt of dying and the slain,
And the fierce thirst and the strong pain.
Dear boys! They shall be young for ever.
The Son of God was once a boy.
They run and leap by a clear river
And of their youth they have great joy.
God, who made boys so clean and good,
Smiles with the eyes of fatherhood.
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poem by Katharine Tynan
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