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Poems (Craik)/The Voice calling

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4507029Poems — The Voice callingDinah Maria Craik
THE VOICE CALLING.
IN the hush of April weather,
With the bees in budding heather,
And the white clouds floating, floating, and the sunshine falling broad:
  While my children down the hill
  Run and leap, and I sit still,—
Through the silence, through the silence art Thou calling, O my God?

  Through my husband's voice that prayeth,
  Though he knows not what he sayeth,
Is it Thou who in Thy Holy Word hast solemn words for me?
  And when he clasps me fast,
  And smiles fondly o'er the past,
And talks, hopeful, of the future—Lord, do I hear only Thee?

  Not in terror nor in thunder
  Comes Thy voice, although it sunder
Flesh from spirit, soul from body, human bliss from human pain:
  All the work that was to do,
  All the joys so sweet and new
Which Thou shewed'st me in a vision—Moses-like—and hid'st again.

  From this Pisgah, lying humbled,
  The long desert where I stumbled,
And the fair plains I shall never reach, seem equal, clear and far:
  On this mountain-top of ease
  Thou wilt bury me in peace;
While my tribes march onward, onward, unto Canaan and war.

  In my boy's loud laughter ringing,
  In the sigh more soft than singing
Of my baby girl that nestles up unto this mortal breast,
  After every voice most dear
  Comes a whisper—"Rest not here."
And the rest Thou art preparing, is it best, Lord, is it best?

  "Lord, a little, little longer!"
  Sobs the earth-love, growing stronger:
He will miss me, and go mourning through his solitary days.
  And heaven were scarcely heaven
  If these lambs which Thou hast given
Were to slip out of our keeping and be lost in the world's ways.

  Lord, it is not fear of dying
  Nor an impious denying
Of Thy will, which forevermore on earth, in heaven, be done:
  But the love that desperate clings
  Unto these my precious things
In the beauty of the daylight, and the glory of the

  Ah, Thou still art calling, calling,
  With a soft voice unappalling;
And it vibrates in far circles through the everlasting years;
  When Thou knockest, even so!
  I will arise and go.—
What, my little ones, more violets?—Nay, be patient—mother hears.