Poems (Larcom)/Godsends

by Lucy Larcom

GODSENDS.

NOT the windfall makes us rich,
 But the slowly ripened fruit,
Full of sun-warmed nectar, which
 Drops, a patient need to suit.

Mean is every bauble brought,
 Favor of the mean to buy.
Offer us no gift unfraught
 With the largeness of the sky.

Offer but the breadth of love;
 Narrower boon is none at all.
Search for us the deeps above;
 Not the soil where earth-worms crawl.

Give the glory of a flower;
 Radiant leaf-bough; blooming thorn;
Light that seas and mountains shower;
 Rosy cheer of days new-born.

God sends what the true heart brings:
 Stranger or familiar hand,
Priest among His holy things,
 Only bears the gift He planned.

And the best of all He sends
 Is no measured dole, but love;
Is not cumbering goods, but friends;
 Winged souls with ours to move.

Soon we tire of pleasure's toy;
 Flashes o'er us, while we grope,
Glory of remoter joy;
 Beckoning of a larger hope:

Far as dreams, yet close at hand;
 Worlds unveiled in one soul's bound,—
Riches of the sun-vaults grand
 At your threshold may be found.

Learn the fools' gold to despise;
 Coinage of heaven's mint to know
In the home-illuming eyes;
 In the fireside's quiet glow;

In the roof-tree's timid bud;
 Hues that near horizons wear;
Planets your own sky that stud;
 Your own window's breath of air.

Naught but light from loftiest star;
 Naught than life more rare or new.
All the real Godsends are
 Common as the daily dew.