As of a day to which all days
Were footsteps in God's secret way::
Until a folding sense, like prayer,
Which is, as God is, everywhere,
Gathered about thee; and a voice
Spake to thee without any noise,
Being of the silence :- Hail,' it said,
'Thou that art highly favourèd;
The Lord is with thee here and now;
Blessed among all women thou.'

Ah! knew'st thou of the end, when first
That Babe was on thy bosom nurs'd ?—
Or when He tottered round thy knee
Did thy great sorrow dawn on thee?—
And through His boyhood, year by year
Eating with Him the Passover,
Didst thou discern confusedly

That holier sacrament, when He,

The bitter cup about to quaff,

Should break the bread and eat thereof?

Or came not yet the knowledge, even
Till on some day forecast in Heaven

His feet passed through thy door to press
Upon His Father's business?—

Or still was God's high secret kept?

Nay, but I think the whisper crept

Like growth through childhood. Work and play, Things common to the course of day,

Awed thee with meanings unfulfill'd ;

And all through girlhood, something still'd

Thy senses like the birth of light,

When thou hast trimmed thy lamp at night
Or washed thy garments in the stream;
To whose white bed had come the dream
That He was thine and thou wast His
Who feeds among the field-lilies.

O solemn shadow of the end

In that wise spirit long contain'd!

O awful end! and those unsaid
Long years when It was Finished!

Mind'st thou not (when the twilight gone Left darkness in the house of John) Between the naked window-bars

That spacious vigil of the stars?

For thou, a watcher even as they,

Wouldst rise from where throughout the day
Thou wroughtest raiment for His poor;
And, finding the fixed terms endure

Of day and night which never brought
Sounds of His coming chariot,

Wouldst lift through cloud-waste unexplor'd
Those eyes which said, 'How long, O Lord?'
Then that disciple whom He loved,

Well heeding, haply would be moved
To ask thy blessing in His name ;
And that one thought in both, the same
Though silent, then would clasp ye round
To weep together,-tears long bound,
Sick tears of patience, dumb and slow.
Yet, 'Surely I come quickly,'-so
He said, from life and death gone home.
Amen even so, Lord Jesus, come!

But oh what human tongue can speak That day when death was sent to break From the tir'd spirit, like a veil,

Its covenant with Gabriel

Endured at length unto the end?
What human thought can apprehend
That mystery of motherhood
When thy Beloved at length renew'd
The sweet communion severèd,—
His left hand underneath thine head

And His right hand embracing thee?— Lo! He was thine, and this is He!

Soul, is it Faith, or Love, or Hope,
That lets me see her standing up
Where the light of the Throne is bright?
Unto the left, unto the right,
The cherubim, arrayed, conjoint,
Float inward to a golden point,
And from between the seraphim
The glory issues for a hymn.
O Mary Mother, be not loth

To listen,-thou whom the stars clothe,
Who seest and mayst not be seen!
Hear us at last, O Mary Queen!
Into our shadow bend thy face,
Bowing thee from the secret place,
O Mary Virgin, full of grace !