Page:Roden Noel - A Little Child's Monument - 1881.pdf/117

Will he not come now, pure and stilly,
And touch, and whisper "Father mine,
I am not dead, dear; it is I!"
Like Jesus, when He saw them pine
So for Him after Calvary?

Yea, voices call to me, my love,
In twilight, and they name thy name!
Alas! I am not sure, my dove,
If they be thine! they do not seem the same!
And in my dreams they whisper still,
Often they seem to sob and moan,
That I may not, for all my will,
Surely know them for thine own:
I deem they may be demon hosts who jeer,
Maddening mortals with false hope and fear.
So rather I return within,
Afar from sense-deluding din;
By the upheaval of my being
Attain to realms of clearer seeing,
Find thy very self by faith,
High o'er the welter of dim death,
Throned o'er mists of mortal strife
In luminous airs of ampler life.
Death is a shadow of our fall;
But ah! how many a heavier pall
Hangs o'er dead souls! Oblivion!
Discord! all monster growths that overrun