Poems (Cary)/A Prayer

For works with similar titles, see Prayer.
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A PRAYER.
Forgive me, God! forgive thy child, I pray, And if I sin, thy holy spirit moveMy heart to better moods: I cannot say, Disjoin my human heart from human love!
If, in the rainy woods, the traveler sees, Through some black gap, a splendor fair and white,Shining beneath the wild rough-rinded trees, His steps turn thither. Through the infinite
Of darkness that would else be, as we pass From silence into silence, round our way,Love shineth so. Doth not the mower stay His scythe, if that a bird be in the grass?
If God be love, then love is likest God, And our low natures the divineness mock,If, when we hear the blest "Arise and walk," We turn our faces back against the sod.
The plowman, tired, among the furrowed corn, Leans on the ox's shoulder; done with play,Childhood among the daisies drops away Into the lap of sleep, and dreams till morn.
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It is as if, when angels had their birth, The one with heaviest glory on its wings,Dropt from its proper sphere into the earth, Where, piteous of our mortal needs, it sings.
Sings sweeter melodies than winds do make, Playing their dulcimers for the young May;Blessed Forever! if sometimes I take Their beauty round my heart—forgive, I pray!

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