Crosses and troubles a-many have proved me.
One or two women (God bless them!) have loved me.
I have worked and dreamed, and I've talked at will.
Of art and drink I have had my fill.
I've comforted here, and I've succoured there.
I've faced my foes, and I've backed my friends.
I've blundered, and sometimes made amends.
I have prayed for light, and I've known despair.
Now I look before, as I look behind, Come storm, come shine, whatever befall, With a grateful heart and a constant mind, For the end I know is the best of all.
1888-1889
LONDON VOLUNTARIES--To Charles Whibley I--GRAVE
St. Margaret's bells, Quiring their innocent, old-world canticles, Sing in the storied air, All rosy-and-golden, as with memories Of woods at evensong, and sands and seas Disconsolate for that the night is nigh.
O, the low, lingering lights! The large last gleam (Hark! how those brazen choristers cry and call!)
Touching these solemn ancientries, and there, The silent River ranging tide-mark high And the callow, grey-faced Hospital, With the strange glimmer and glamour of a dream!
The Sabbath peace is in the slumbrous trees, And from the wistful, the fast-widowing sky (Hark! how those plangent comforters call and cry!)
Falls as in August plots late roseleaves fall.
The sober Sabbath stir -
Leisurely voices, desultory feet! -
Comes from the dry, dust-coloured street, Where in their summer frocks the girls go by, And sweethearts lean and loiter and confer, Just as they did an hundred years ago, Just as an hundred years to come they will:-
When you and I, Dear Love, lie lost and low, And sweet-throats none our welkin shall fulfil, Nor any sunset fade serene and slow;
But, being dead, we shall not grieve to die.
