Page:Poems Proctor.djvu/57

We cherish their sacred Icons,
 Token of care divine;
And with beaten gold in fret and fold,
 And gems the Czar might wear,
And costliest pearls of the Indian seas,
 We make their vesture fair.
We set them along our altars
 In many a gorgeous row,
The blessed Saviour in their midst,
 And the Virgin, pure as snow;
And lamps we hang before them,
 Soft as the star that shines
In the, rosy west, when the purple clouds
 Drift dark above the pines.
The deep chants ring; the censers swing
 In wreaths of fragrance by;
And there we bend, while our prayers ascend
 To their waiting hearts on high;
And our Lord, and Mary-Mother,
 With faces sweet and grave,
Remembering all their tears and woes,
 Grant every boon they crave.

Have you heard that each true-born Russian,
 Child of the Lord in baptism,
Receives some name of the shining ones
 With the touch of the precious chrism?—
And the saint, thenceforth, is his angel;
 Ready, through gloom or sun,
To share his sorrows and cheer his way
 Till his earthly years are done.