The voice from within

 The cruelest words were mine alone,

Born in the chambers of my mind;

I carved them deep, then called them stone,

And wondered why no peace I’d find.

With years, that stern and watchful voice

Seemed less my own, yet would remain;

It spoke as though it had the choice

To make each tender thought a pain.

I sought no hatred from the world,

But feared the mirror’s searching gaze;

Yet in the morning light unfurled,

The self I judged still breathed and stayed.

Then, walking where the quiet stream

Ran silver through the meadow grass,

I heard the gentler voice of earth:

“No heart is healed by making war.”

So may I learn, as fields grow green,

To meet myself with kinder eyes.

That quiet heaven

 O, let me find that quiet shore

Where anxious names are known no more;

Where leaves, that fall from autumn boughs,

Bear gently down my earthly vows.

Let Heaven be not a distant sphere,

But some still place where none may hear

The clamour of the troubled mind,

And breath comes freely, unconfined.

As lightly as the butterfly

That wanders through the summer sky,

So let me pass from place to place,

Unburdened by the world's embrace.

My steps, like some meandering stream,

May wander farther than I dream;

Yet let them wander where they will—

Some kindly shore may greet them still.

Give me the river's patient art

To yield, yet never lose the heart;

To follow every bend and gleam,

And trust the current with the dream.

Let senses drink the changing scene—

The silver rain, the fields of green,

The swelling cloud, the amber light,

The hush that gathers into night.

Let care grow faint, and fear depart,

And courage kindle in the heart;

Not fashioned by the world's decree,

But wild, unpractised, bold, and free.

Then, if the road be rough or long,

Let hope be still my pilgrim-song;

For he who walks without despair

May find a heaven everywhere.

And when at last the leaves let go,

As all things must, and softly flow,

May I, as freely as the tree,

Release the world—and simply be.

The Hour that we did not name

 The music drowned the honest word,

And midnight kept its own;

We spoke of trifles, lightly heard,

Yet felt what went unsown.

Your shoulder brushed mine—briefly so—

As though by chance we met;

Yet neither moved, nor chose to know

The thing we might regret.

No questions sought the heart beneath,

No answers crossed the air;

Your name, a little wreath of breath,

Dissolved and vanished there.

Without, the rain-wet pavement shone,

The sleeping city gleamed;

And all the world seemed built alone

To shelter what we dreamed.

You spoke of morning—“What shall be

When this strange hour is past?”

But dawn had scarcely touched the sea,

And night was fading fast.

So let tomorrow keep its claim,

Its reckonings and its light;

Tonight we need not give a name

To what belongs to night.

No histories of former days,

No maps of roads ahead;

The heart has wiser, quieter ways

Than all the words we said.

We stood as strangers might have stood,

Yet neither quite withdrew;

The silence understood us good—

And I, perhaps, understood you.

The room grew still; the hour grew late;

The world withdrew its sound.

And there we lingered, face to face,

While darkness gathered round.

Let reason wait beyond the door,

Let daylight ask its due;

Some moments ask for nothing more

Than being wholly true.

And when the final note had died,

And night gave way to day,

We kept the thing we never tried

To speak, nor name, nor say.