Continuous Aspiration

The Souls Travelling

(by Elizabeth Barrett Browning)

GOD, God!

With a childs voice I cry,

Weak, sad, confidingly-

God, God!

Thou knowest, eyelids, raised not always up

Unto Thy love (as none of ours are), droop

As ours, oer many a tear!

Thou knowest, though Thy universe is broad,

Two little tears suffice to cover all:

Thou knowest, Thou, who art so prodigal

Of beauty, we are oft but stricken deer

Expiring in the woods-that care for none

Of those delightsome flowers they die upon.

O blissful Mouth which breathed the mournful breath

We name our souls, self-spoilt!-by that strong passion

Which paled Thee once with sighs,-by that strong death

Which made Thee once unbreathing-from the wrack

Themselves have called around them, call them back,

Back to Thee in continuous aspiration!

For here, O Lord,

For here they travel vainly,-vainly pass

From city-pavement to untrodden sward,

Where the lark finds her deep nest in the grass

Cold with the earths last dew. Yea, very vain

The greatest speed of all these souls of men

Unless they travel upward to the throne

Where sittest THOU, the satisfying ONE,

With help for sins and holy perfectings

For all requirements-while the archangel, raising

Unto Thy face his full ecstatic gazing,

Forgets the rush and rapture of his wings.