 | Idyls of Norway and other poems |  |
144
I WONDER OFT WHY GOD, WHO IS SO GOOD.
X.
I wonder oft why God, who is so good,Has barred so close, so close the gates of death.
I stand and listen with suspended breath
While night and silence round about me brood,
If then, perchance, some spirit-whisper would
Grow audible and pierce my torpid sense.
And oft I feel a presence, veiled, intense,
That pulses softly through the solitude;
But as my soul leaps quivering to my ear
To grasp the potent message, all takes flight,
And from the fields and woods I only hear
The murmurous chorus of the summer night.
I am as one that's dead—yet in his gloom
Feels faintly song of birds above his tomb.
| Idyls of Norway and other poems | |