Youth, In Heaven

Youth, In Heaven

Swedenborg.

Not for them the length-ning shadows,

Falling coldly 'round our lives;

Nearer, nearer, through the ages,

Life's new spring for them arrives.

Not for them the doubt and anguish

Of an old and loveless age;

Dropping sadly tears of sorrow,

On life's faded, blotted, page.

Not for them the hopeless clinging,

To life's worn and feeble strands;

Till the last has ceased to tremble,

In our aged, withered hands.

Not for them, the mournful dimming

Of the weary tear-stained eye,

That has seen the sad procession,

Of its dearest hopes go by.

Never lines of light and darkness,

Thread the brows forever fair;

And the eldest of the angels,

Seems the youngest brother there.

There the stream of life doth never

Cross the mournful plain of death;

And the gates of light are ever

Closed against its icy breath.

Frances Ellen Watkins (Frances Ellen Watkins Harper)

2:2, p. 64

1860.02