Deliverance

O Death, fair Death, sole comforter and sweet, Nor Love nor Hope can give such gifts as thine. Sleep hardly shows us round thy shadowy shrine What roses hang, what music floats, what feet Pass and what wings of angels. We repeat Wild words or mild, disastrous or divine, Blind prayer, blind imprecation, seeing no sign Nor hearing aught of thee not faint and fleet As words of men or snowflakes on the wind. But if we chide thee, saying "Thou hast sinned, thou hast sinned, Dark Death, to take so sweet a light away As shone but late, though shadowed, in our skies," We hear thine answer--"Night has given what day Denied him: darkness hath unsealed his eyes."