Page:Poems of Emma Lazarus vol 2.djvu/267

A cruel law, but none the less supreme,
Old as the world, yea, old as destiny.
Sorrow baptizes us, a fatal scheme ;
All things at this sad price we still must buy.
The harvest needs the dew to make it ripe,
And man to live, to feel, has need of tears.
Joy chooses a bruised plant to be her typo,
That, drenched with rain, still many a blossom bears.
Didst thou not say this folly long had slept ?
Art thou not happy, young, a welcome guest ?
And those light pleasures that give life its zest,
How wouldst thou value if thou hadst not wept ?
When, lying in the sunlight on the grass,
Freely thou drink'st with some old friend — confess,
Wouldst thou so cordially uplift thy glass,
Hadst thou not weighed the worth of cheerfulness ?
Would flowers be so dear unto thy heart,
The verse of Petrarch, warblings of the bird,
Shakespeare and Nature, Angelo and Art,
But that thine ancient sobs therein tliou honrd ?
Couldst thou conceive the ineffable peace of heaven.
Night's silence, murmurs of the wave that flows,
If sleeplessness and fever had not driven
Thy thought to yearn for infinite repose ?
By a fair woman's love art thou not blest ?