My Own Shall Come To Me
Serene I fold my hands and wait,
Nor care for wind, nor tide, nor sea.
I rave no more ‘gainst time or fate,
For lo! my own shall come to me.
I stay my haste, I make delays,
For what avails this eager pace?
I stand amid the eternal ways,
And what is mine shall know my face.
Asleep, awake, by night or day
The friends I seek are seeking me;
No wind can drive my bark astray,
Nor change the tide of destiny.
What matter if I stand alone?
I wait with joy the coming years;
My heart shall reap what it has sown.
And gather up its fruit of tears.
The stars come nightly to the sky;
The tidal wave comes to the sea;
Nor time, nor space, nor deep, nor high,
Can keep my own away from me.
The waters know their own and draw
The brook that springs in yonder heights;
So flows the good with equal law
Unto the soul of pure delights.
—John Burroughs.
The Moment Of Decision
Once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide,
In the strife of Truth and Falsehood, for the good or evil side;
Some great cause, God’s new Messiah offering each the bloom or blight;
Parts the goats upon the left hand, and the sheep upon the right;
And the choice goes by forever ‘twixt that darkness and that light.
—J. H. Jowett.
Alternate Reading: II Peter 2: 10-22.