Poems (Jackson)/The Singer's Friends

by Helen Hunt Jackson

THE SINGER'S FRIENDS.

E roamed the earth with lonely feet:
 No homestead lured him back;
Lands are so full; life is so sweet;
Such skies and suns forever meet
To make each day's great joy complete;
 T was strange that he so much must lack.

'T was stranger yet that joy could still
 His bosom overflow;
That smallest things his soul could fill
With ecstasy and song, whose thrill
No pain could hinder or could chill,
 As lonely he went to and fro.

But ever if there came a day,
 Which on his joy and song
So heavy load of sorrow ay
That heart and voice could not obey,
And feet refused the lonely way,
 So lonely, and so hard, and long.

It always chanced,—though chance is not,
 The word when God befriends,—
That on such days to him was brought
Echo from some old song, forgot,
Which sudden made his lonely lot
 Seem cast for worthier, sweeter ends.

Some stranger whose sad eyes were wet
 With tears, would take his hands,
Saying, "O Singer, my great debt
To thee I never can forget.
My grief in thy grief's words was set,
 And comforted forever stands."

Or else he heard, borne on the air
 Where merry music rang,
Making the fair day still more fair,
Lifting the burden off of care,
Old words of his that did their share,
 While happy people laughed and sang.

Or else,—O, sacredest of all,
 And sweetest recompense,—
Love used his words, its love to call
By name: of his dead joy, the thrall
Waked live joy still, and could forestall
 Love's utmost passion's subtlest sense.

So when at last, in lonely grave,
 He laid his lonely head,
No loving heart more tears need crave;
Nowhere more sacred grasses wave;
All human hearts to whom he gave
 Grieved like friends' hearts when he was dead.