February 9

Fear not, I am the First and the Last.

GRAND is the leisure of the earth; She gives her happy myriads birth,

And after harvest fears not dearth,

But goes to sleep in snow-wreaths dim.

Dread is the leisure up above

The while He sits whose name is Love

And waits, as Noah did, for the dove,

To wit if she would fly to Him.

He waits for us, while, houseless things,

We beat about with bruised wings

On the dark floods and water-springs,

The ruined world, the desolate sea;

With open windows from the prime

All night, all day, He waits sublime,

Until the fulness of the time

Decreed from His eternity.

JEAN

INGELOW


F

THE NEW EARTH