In the fair garden of celestial Peace <br />Walketh a Gardener in meekness clad; <br />Fair are the flowers that wreathe his dewy locks, <br />And his mysterious eyes are sweet and sad. <br /> <br />Fair are the silent foldings of his robes, <br />Falling with saintly calmness to his feet; <br />And when he walks, each floweret to his will <br />With living pulse of sweet accord doth beat. <br /> <br />Every green leaf thrills to its tender heart, <br />In the mild summer radiance of his eye; <br />No fear of storm, or cold, or bitter frost, <br />Shadows the flowerets when their sun is nigh. <br /> <br />And all our pleasant haunts of earthly love <br />Are nurseries to those gardens of the air; <br />And his far-darting eye, with starry beam, <br />Watcheth the growing of his treasures there. <br /> <br />We call them ours, o'erswept with selfish tears, <br />O'erwatched with restless longings night and day; <br />Forgetful of the high, mysterious right <br />He holds to bear our cherished plants away. <br /> <br />But when some sunny spot in those bright fields <br />Needs the fair presence of an added flower, <br />down sweeps a starry angel in the night: <br />At morn, the rose has vanished from our bower. <br /> <br />Where stood our tree, our flower, there is a grave! <br />Blank, silent, vacant, but in worlds above, <br />Like a new star outblossomed in the skies, <br />The angels hail an added flower of love. <br /> <br />Dear friend, no more upon that lonely mound, <br />Strewed with the red and yellow autumn leaf, <br />Drop thou the tear, but raise the fainting eye <br />Beyond the autumn mists of earthly grief. <br /> <br />Thy garden rosebud bore, within its breast, <br />Those mysteries of color, warm and bright, <br />That the bleak climate of this lower sphere <br />Could never waken into form and light. <br /> <br />Yes, the sweet Gardener hath borne her hence, <br />Nor must thou ask to take her thence away; <br />Thou shalt behold her in some coming hour, <br />Full-blossomed in his fields of cloudless day.<br /><br />Harriet Beecher Stowe<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/lines-52/
