 | Reuben and Other Poems |  |
“Alas!
We know not what a day may bring to pass:
Why need we set our hearts on worldly gear,
And death, that severs us and it, so near—
So ever near that any footslip may
From all our clinging hoards snatch us away!
And then to die as unprepared as now!
O, reverend father, thou shalt have my cow.
But pray for me to Mary, Mother in Heaven,
On bended knees, till I am wholly shriven.”
We know not what a day may bring to pass:
Why need we set our hearts on worldly gear,
And death, that severs us and it, so near—
So ever near that any footslip may
From all our clinging hoards snatch us away!
192
O, reverend father, thou shalt have my cow.
But pray for me to Mary, Mother in Heaven,
On bended knees, till I am wholly shriven.”
| Reuben and Other Poems | |