A Little Child's Monument/Guardian Angels of Children
Verily their angels
Ever behold the face
Of our Eternal Father,
Sunned in His full grace.
Yet in the stormless sunshine
They do not love to dwell;
There is no place in heaven
They love half so well
As the lowly chamber
Of a little child;
Dearer to them the breathing
Of his bosom mild
Than are all the pæans
Round about the throne,
Scorning the cold splendour
Of an idle crown.
Love rears her radiant palace
In our shadow-world of fears,
She mourns by our dark ocean
Of tempestuous tears!
Angels tend the children
Waking or asleep,
They rebuke the evil,
Who have made them weep.
Heaven's crystal glory gloweth
Rainbowed as they fly
To where earth's night, illumined
In their sweet charity,
Dawneth silently!
In the lordly castle,
In the dungeon deep.
In the lonely hovel,
Love-vigil they keep.
Fair be the children, cherished,
Sweethearted, rosed with health,
Or poor and starved, and wanting
The soul's holier wealth,
Inheritors of sorrow,
By leaguering ills deformed,
Plague-smitten soul and body,
Poor hearts love never warmed,—
With all the angels tarry;
And though the fire be low,
They will fan the ember
To a living glow;
Inhabiting our sorrow,
Our chilled heart of wrong,
Until it yield, and mellow
Bloom to a sweet song.
They, knowing our mortal fever
Soon will pass away,
Through long nights of sorrow
Calm await the Day.
Asleep they lead the lambkins
To meadows of sweet dream,
In gentle arms they bear them
By many a cooling stream;
Where the sunbeams cherish
White and yellow flowers,
They may sail on silver
Among fairy bowers,
Losing all the terror
Of our waking world,
Sails of their frail shallop
In flowery havens furled.
A poor boy rides the pony
So wistfully admired,
While a poor maiden nurses
The doll richly attired;
They feel no more so tired!
Pains and griefs no longer
Vex the innocent breast,
Now dear angels lull them
Into such deep rest!
Cruel faces vanish,
And all the loveless waste,
In a fair home they find them,
Tenderly embraced.
And when we deem them dying,
More life the Lord imparts,
Their faint frail breath subsideth
On warm angel hearts;
Like a wavelet failing
On a sand so fair:
Ah! then the angels welcome
Heaven's cloudless crystal air!
Because of the frail snow-flake
Their kind bosoms wear.
The snow-flake melts in glory,
The little child awakes;
Under the smiles of Jesus,
Death-frozen for our sakes,
There are no more snow-flakes!
With our snows bejewelled
How the angels shine,
Earth's frozen flower a sunlet
Pulsing light divine!
Dear babes, help one another!
All the saints help you:
We are with them in heaven,
Doing as they do.
Every cross of sorrow
Is a blessed pain;
The Lord Jesus bore it,
Proving it pure gain.