THREE WORLDS.
WITHIN three worlds my Sorrow dwells;
Each made her own by heavenly right;
And one is sadly sweet and fair,
And one is bright beyond compare,
And one is void of light.
One is the world of long-past things;
There she can go at will, and sit
And sun herself in love’s embrace,
And see upon a vanished face
The tender, old-time meanings flit.
The second, veiled in glory dim,
She only dares in part explore;
Upon its misty bound she stands,
And reaches out imploring hands
It is the world of unknown joy,
Where thou, Beloved, amid thy kin,
The saints of God, the Sons of Light,
The company in robes of white,
Hast been made free to enter in.
She sees thee, companied with these,
Standing far off among the Blest,
And is content to watch and wait,
To stand afar without the gate,
Nor interrupt thy perfect rest.
And so she turns, and down she sinks
To her third world, that dreary one,
Which once was shared and lit by thee,
And never any more can be,
In which she dwelleth all alone.
It were too dark a world to bear,
Could she not go, her pain to still,
Into the fair world of the Past,
Into the glory, sure and vast,
In these three worlds my Sorrow sits,
And each is dear because of thee;
I joyed in that, I wait in this,
And in the fulness of thy bliss
Thou waitest too, I know, for me.