November 26

I have covered thee in the shadow of mine hand.

IF God speak to thee in the summer air, The cool soft breath thou leanest forth to feel Upon thy forehead; dost thou feel it God? Nay, but the wind: and when heart speaks to heart, And face to face, when friends meet happily, And all is merry, God is also there;— But thou perceivest but thy fellow's part; And when out of the dewy garden green Some liquid syllables of music strike A sudden speechless rapture through thy frame, Is it God's voice that moves thee? Nay, the bird's,— Who sings to God, and all the world and thee. But when the sharp strokes flesh and heart run through, For thee, and not another; only known, In all the universe, through sense of thine; Not caught by eye or ear, not felt by touch, Nor apprehended by the spirit's sight, But only by the hidden, tortured nerves, And all their incommunicable pain,— God speaks Himself to us, as mothers speak To their own babes, upon the tender flesh With fond familiar touches close and dear;— Because He cannot choose a softer way To make us feel that He Himself is near, And each apart His own Beloved and Known.

HARRIET ELEANOR HAMILTON KING

THE MESSENGERS