Will the Wrong, the Right assailing, Wring from suffering helpless wailing In the great hereafter?— Conquered Good, with banners trailing, Seeking streams for Hope’s regaling, Be mirage-lured, till faint and failing, Faith becomes a phantom, sailing Through the great hereafter? Or, shall our spirit eyes beholding God’s mysterious plans unfolding In the great hereafter, See His strength the Right upholding And his love the weak enfolding In the great hereafter? Struggling here with opposition, Gives, perchance, the strong volition Some may need for angel mission, In the great hereafter; And the ills of life’s condition, To the tried may bring fruition Of a joyous, sweet elysian In the great hereafter. What has seemed Fate’s unfair dealing, May unveil, a joy revealing In the great hereafter: Though denying our appealing, Made in agony of feeling, God may still, with love’s own healing, _Higher destiny, be sealing_ For the Great Hereafter. Late October. The night was black—the dismal rain First dripped from sullen, inky clouds, And then was dashed against the pane, By winds that shrieked like demon crowds; When, on the midnight’s ebon breast, The storm, a moment, lulled to rest, I heard this low, half stifled moan With sorrow braided in the tone— “Who cares for me? Who, who?” The lurid lightning’s fitful glare Lit all the far, horizon’s rim— It showed the walnut, stripped and bare, And clutching one great, leafless limb Sat something weird, of dusky form; Defenceless, in the pelting storm, She faced alone that angry sky— October’s voice seemed in the cry, “Who cares for me? Who, Who?” With rush and wrench an angered fiend The loosened shutters clanged and swung, His single stroke the grove had preened And wide its deadened branches flung, And from the wide, o’er-hanging eaves He tore the crimson ivy leaves And wildly whirled them on the blast— The phantom murmured, as they passed, “Who cares for me? Who, Who?” The maples writhed as, tempest torn, Their branches beat the gables high, And, in the storm’s dark bosom borne, Mad thunders bellowed thro’ the sky. She spurned the spruce, with stately form, Whose robes of green might shield and warm, And yet, like sobbing on the gale, Was monotoned that dismal wail, “Who cares for me? Who, Who?” Again the leaping lightnings glared, The wind swept down the clinging vines, In twisting gusts the trees were bared, It rocked and tossed the rasping pines; Unmoved, amid the tempest there, And as the wraith of grim despair, Still clutched the limb, that dusky form, Repeating to the driving storm, “Who cares for me? Who, who?”