TEARS BY ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING Thank God, bless God, all ye who suffer not More grief than ye can weep for. That is wellThat is light grieving! lighter, none befell Since Adam forfeited the primal lot. Tears! what are tears? The babe weeps in its cot, Of high-faned hills the poet has forgot Such moisture on his cheeks. Thank God for grace, Ye who weep only! If, as some have done, Ye grope tear-blinded in a desert place And touch but tombs,-look up! those tears will run TEARS BY LIZETTE WOODWORTH REESE When I consider Life and its few years- A rose choked in the grass; an hour of fears; The gusts that past a darkening shore do beat; The burst of music down an unlistening street, I wonder at the idleness of tears. Ye old, old dead, and ye of yesternight, Chieftains, and bards, and keepers of the sheep, By every cup of sorrow that you had, Loose me from tears, and make me see aright How each hath back what once he stayed to weep: Homer his sight, David his little lad! PANDORA'S SONG (From the Fire-Bringer) BY WILLIAM VAUGHN MOODY Of wounds and sore defeat I made a helmet for my head |