Hunter of souls! the loving chase so nigh Those spirits twain had never come before. They saw the sacred flame within thine eye; To them the maple’s depths quick glory wore, As though God’s hand had lit His altar-fire in it, And made a fane, of virgin verdure pleached, Wherefrom thou might’st in numbers musical Expound the age-sweet words thy Francis preached To thee and thine, of God’s benignant thrall That broodeth over all. And they, athirst for comfort, sipped thy song, But drank not yet thy deeper homily. Not yet, but when parturient pangs grew strong, And from its cell the young soul struggled free-- A new joy, trailing grief, A little crumpled leaf, Blighted before it burgeoned from the stem-- Thou, as the fabled robin to the rood, Wert minister of charity to them; And from the shadows of sad parenthood They heard and understood. Makes God one soul a lure for snaring three? Ah! surely; so this nursling of the nest, This teen-touched joy, ere birth anoint of thee, Yet bears thy chrismal music in her breast. Five Mays have come and sped Above her sunny head, And still the happy song abides in her. For though on maimed limbs the body creeps, It doth a spirit house whose pinions stir Familiarly the far cerulean steeps Where God His mansion keeps. So come, O! throstle, Thou golden-tongued apostle And little brown-frocked brother Of the loved Assisian! Sing courage to the mother, Sing strength into the man, That she who in another May Came out of heaven, trailing care, May never know that sometimes gray Earth’s roof is and its cupboards bare. To them in whose sad May-time thou Sang’st comfort and thy maple bough, To tinge the presaged dole with sweet, O! prophet then, be prophet now And paraclete! TO A PLAIN SWEETHEART BY T. A. DALY I love thee, dear, for what thou art, Nor would I wish thee otherwise, For when thy lashes lift apart I read, deep-mirrored in thine eyes, The glory of a modest heart. Wert thou as fair as thou art good, It were not given to any man, With daring eyes of flesh and blood, To look thee in the face and scan The splendor of thy womanhood. TO A ROBIN BY T. A. DALY I heard thee, joyous votary, Pour forth thy heart in one Sweet simple strain of melody To greet the rising sun, When he across the morning’s verge his first faint flare had flung And found the crimson of thy breast the whisp’ring leaves among, In thine own tree Which sheltered thee, Thy mate, thy nest, thy young.