Perhaps

More of the island do they see Whose feet the highest summits press, And more of death—that dreadful sea For whose deep wrong seems no redress.

Vain, o’er the dark horizon, vain For the white angel’s wings I scan; They come, they go, they come again; But in them is there hope for man?

But they who from deep caverns gaze, Or who on highest summits are, Behold the glory he displays Who gave the eye to see the star.

Perhaps our Undersea begins Here; through eternity to run, For those who suffer for the sins In some far puter island done.

I view the ocean—stormy, still— It seems so sure; it seems so vast, I only trust th’ Almighty will Some happy home shall give at last.

Where I shall find my Oversea When the tense cord of living snaps I do not know; but life must be; For justice there is no perhaps.

No truth, whatever be its name, To Mathematics is offence; For love demands no mightier claim, No holier creed than innocence.

We hear opinion’s vain perhaps, And think it faith to call unwise Who hear the heart’s low thunder claps Of some grand cadence—truth’s device.

Oh, truth, thy growth is full of speed. First must thy roots strike deeply down, Thou hast the life within the seed, The tree, alas! has not yet grown.

Prophet is he whose earnest brain And upturned cup yet holdeth still, Waiting in trust the holy rain, That blackest clouds shall sooner fill;

Or one whose thoughts, like falling rain, Pour forth from overflowing cup; Who could not, if he would, restrain What the glad sunlight gathered up.

And if upon his bosom writ Some bow of hope mankind may mark, Or on the tears wrung out of it What matter if himself be dark.