THE MISERERE

by: Harriet Beecher Stowe (1811-1896)

      OT of the earth that music! all things fade;
      Vanish the pictured walls! and, one by one,
      The starry candles silently expire!
       
      And now, O Jesus! round that silent cross
      A moment's pause, a hush as of the grave.
      Now rises slow a silver mist of sound,
      And all the heavens break out in drops of grief;
      A rain of sobbing sweetness, swelling, dying,
      Voice into voice inweaving with sweet throbs,
      And fluttering pulses of impassioned moan, --
      Veiled voices, in whose wailing there is awe,
      And mysteries of love and agony,
      A yearning anguish of celestial souls,
      A shiver as of wings trembling the air,
      As if God's shining doves, his spotless birds,
      Wailed with a nightingale's heart-break of grief,
      In this their starless night, when for our sins
      Their sun, their life, their love, hangs darkly there,
      Like a slain lamb, bleeding his life away!

"The Miserere" is reprinted from The Writings of Harriet Beecher Stowe, Vol. 15. Harriet Beecher Stowe. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Company, 1896.

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