class="line">On face and limbs and hair!

EASTER-SONG

Maiden, awake! For Christ is born again!

And let your feet disdain

The paths whereby of late they have been led.

Now Death itself is dead,

And Love hath birth,

And all things mournful find no place on earth.

This morn ye all must go another way

Than ye went yesterday.

Not with sad faces shall ye silent go

Where He hath suffered so;

But where there be

Full many flowers shall ye wend joyfully.

Moreover, too, ye must be clad in white,

As if the ended night

Were but your bridal-morn's foreshadowing.

And ye must also sing

In angel-wise:

So shall ye be most worthy in His eyes.

Maidens, arise! I know where many flowers

Have grown these many hours

To make more perfect this glad Easter-day;

Where tall white lilies sway

On slender stem,

Waiting for you to come and garner them;

Where banks of mayflowers are, all pink and white,

Which will Him well delight;

And yellow buttercups, and growing grass

Through which the Spring winds pass;

And mosses wet,

Well strown with many a new-born violet.

All these and every other flower are here.

Will ye not draw anear

And gather them for Him, and in His name,

Whom all men now proclaim

Their living King?

Behold how all these wait your harvesting!

Moreover, see the darkness of His house!

Think ye that He allows

Such glory of glad color and perfume,

But to destroy the gloom

That hath held fast

His altar-place these many days gone past?

For this alone these blossoms had their birth,—

To show His perfect worth!

Therefore, O Maidens, ye must go apace

To that strange garden-place

And gather all

These living flowers for His high festival.

For now hath come the long-desired day,

Wherein Love hath full sway!

Open the gates, O ye who guard His home,

His handmaidens are come!

Open them wide,

That all may enter in this Easter-tide!

Then, maidens, come, with song and lute-playing,

And all your wild flowers bring

And strew them on His altar; while the sun—

Seeing what hath been done—

Shines strong once more,

Knowing that Death hath Christ for conqueror.

THE RAIN

O ye who so unceasing praise the Sun;

Ye who find nothing worthy of your love

But the Sun's face and the strong light thereof;

Who, when the day is done,

Are all uncomforted

Unless the night be crowned with many a star,

Or mellow light be shed

From the ancient moon that gazeth from afar,

With pitiless calm, upon the old, tired Earth;

O ye to whom the skies

Must be forever fair to free your eyes

From mortal pain;—

Have ye not known the great exceeding worth

Of that soft peace which cometh with the Rain?

Behold! the wisest of you knows no thing

That hath such title to man's worshipping

As the first sudden day

The slumbrous Earth is wakened into Spring;

When heavy clouds and gray

Come up the southern way,

And their bold challenge throw

In the face of the frightened snow

That covereth the ground.

What need they now the armies of the Sun

Whose trumpets now do sound?

Alas, the powerless Sun!

Hath he not waged his wars for days gone past,

Each morning drawing up his cohorts vast

And leading them with slow and even paces

To assault once more the impenetrable places,

Where, crystal-bound,

The river moveth on with silent