ENTICED.

Enticed.

I.

WITH

ITH what clear guile of gracious love enticed, I follow forward, as from room to room, Through doors that open into light from gloom, To find and lose, and find again the Christ!

He stands and knocks, and bids me ope the door;
Without he stands, and asks to enter in :

Why should he seek a shelter sad with sin?
Will he but knock and ask, and nothing more?

He knows what ways I take to shut my heart,
And if he will he can himself undo

My foolish fastenings, or by force break through, Nor wait till I fulfill my needless part.

But nay, he will not choose to enter so,—

He will not be my guest without consent,
Nor, though I say “Come in,” is he content;
I must arise and ope, or he will go.

He shall not go; I do arise and ope,

"Come in, dear Lord, come in and sup with me, Oh, blessed guest, and let me sup with thee,”Where is the door? for in this dark I grope,

And cannot find it soon enough; my hand,

Shut hard, holds fast the one sure key I need,
And trembles, shaken with its eager heed;
No other key will answer my demand.

The door between is some command undone;
Obedience is the key that slides the bar,

And lets him in, who stands so near, so far;
The doors are many, but the key is one.

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Which door, dear Lord? knock, speak, that I may know;
Hark, heart, he answers with his hand and voice-
Oh, still small sign, I tremble and rejoice,
Nor longer doubt which way my feet must go.

Full lief and soon this door would open too,
If once my key might find the narrow slit
Which, being so narrow, is so hard to hit-
But lo! one little ray that glimmers through,

Not spreading light, but lighting to the light-
Now steady, hand, for good speed's sake be slow,
One straight right aim, a pulse of pressure, so,-
How small, how great, the change from dark to bright!

II.

Now he is here I seem no longer here!

This place of light is not my chamber dim,

It is not he with me, but I with him,

And host, not guest, he breaks the bread of cheer.

I was borne onward at his greeting,—he

Earthward had come, but heavenward I had gone;
Drawing him hither, I was thither drawn,

Scarce welcoming him to hear him welcome me!

I lie upon the bosom of my Lord,

And feel his heart, and time my heart thereby ;
The tune so sweet, I have no need to try,
But rest and trust, and beat the perfect chord.

A little while I lie upon his heart,

Feasting on love, and loving there to feast,

And then, once more, the shadows are increased Around me, and I feel my Lord depart.

THE ROSE.

Again alone, but in a farther place

I sit with darkness, waiting for a sign; Again I hear the same sweet plea divine, And suit, outside, of hospitable grace.

This is his guile,-he makes me act the host
To shelter him, and lo! he shelters me;
Asking for alms, he summons me to be
A guest at banquets of the Holy Ghost.

So, on and on, through many an opening door
That gladly opens to the key I bring,

From brightening court to court of Christ, my King,
Hope-led, love-fed, I journey evermore.

At last I trust these changing scenes will cease ;
There is a court I hear where he abides;

No door beyond, that further glory hides.

My host at home, all change is changed to peace.
WILLIAM C. WILKINSON.

G

The Rose.

O, lovely Rose !

Tell her that wastes her time and me,
That now she knows,

When I resemble her to thee,

How sweet and fair she seems to be.

Tell her that's young,

And shuns to have her graces spied,
That hadst thou sprung

In deserts where no men abide,
Thou must have uncommended died.

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Small is the worth

Of beauty from the light retired;
Bid her come forth-
Suffer herself to be desired,
And not blush so to be admired.

Then die, that she
The common fate of all things rare
May read in thee,-

How small a part of time they share
That are so wondrous sweet and fair.

EDMUND WALLER.

Yet though thou fade,

From thy dead leaves let fragrance rise
To teach the maid

That goodness time's rude hand defies,
That virtue lives when beauty dies.

HENRY KIRKE WHITE.

[This latter stanza was written by Kirke White on the margin of a borrowed volume of Waller's poems.]

Under the Violets.

HER hands are cold, her face is white;

No more her pulses come and go;
Her eyes are shut to life and light:

Fold the white vesture, snow on snow,
And lay her where the violets blow.

But not beneath a graven stone,

To plead for tears with alien eyes;
A slender cross of wood alone

Shall say that here a maiden lies,
In peace, beneath the peaceful skies.

UNDER THE VIOLETS.

And gray old trees of hugest limb
Shall wheel their circling shadows round,
To make the scorching sunlight dim
That drinks the greenness from the ground,
And drop the dead leaves on her mound.

When o'er their boughs the squirrels run,
And through their leaves the robins call,
And ripening in the autumn sun

The acorns and the chestnuts fall,
Doubt not that she will heed them all.

For her the morning choir shall sing
Its matins from the branches high;
And every minstrel voice of spring,

That thrills beneath the April sky,
Shall greet her with its earliest cry.

When, turning round their dial track,

Eastward the lengthening shadows pass, Her little mourners clad in black,

The crickets, sliding through the grass,
Shall pipe to her an evening mass.

At last the rootlets of the trees

Shall find the prison where she lies,
And bear the buried dust they seize

In leaves and blossoms to the skies;
So may the soul that warmed it rise!

If any, born of kindlier blood,

Should ask: What maiden sleeps below? Say only this: A tender bud,

That tried to blossom in the snow,

Lies withered where the violets blow.

OLIVER W. HOLMES.

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