Think, in mounting higher, the angels would press on us, and aspire to drop some golden orb of perfect song into our deep, dear silence.

God answers sharp and sudden on some prayers, And thrusts the thing we have prayed for in our face, A gauntlet with a gift in it.

With stammering lips and insufficient sound I strive and struggle to deliver right the music of my nature.

And I smiled to think God's greatness flowed around our incompleteness; Round our restlessness, His rest.

My future will not copy my fair past, I wrote that once. And, thinking at my side my ministering life-angel justified the word by his appealing look upcast to the white throne of God.

Suddenly, as rare things will, it vanished.

When we first met and loved, I did not build Upon the event with marble. . . .