IF, in the silence of this lonely eve, <br />With the street lamp pale flickering on the wall, <br />An angel were to whisper me, 'Believe-- <br />It shall be given thee. Call!'--whom should I call? <br /> <br />And then I were to see thee gliding in <br />Clad in known garments, that with empty fold <br />Lie in my keeping, and my fingers, thin <br />As thine were once, to feel in thy safe hold: <br /> <br />'I should fall weeping on thy neck and say, <br />'I have so suffered since--since--' But my tears <br />Would stop, remembering how thou count'st thy day <br />A day that is with God a thousand years. <br /> <br />Then what are these sad days, months, years of mine, <br />To thine eternity of full delight? <br />What my whole life, when myriad lives divine <br />May wait, each leading to a higher height? <br /> <br />I lose myself--I faint. Beloved, best, <br />Let me still dream, thy dear humanity <br />Sits with me here, my head upon thy breast, <br />And then I will go back to heaven with thee.<br /><br />Dinah Maria Mulock Craik<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/an-evening-guest/
