Classic Poem

As children when, with heavy tread,
Men sad of face, unseen before,
Have borne away their mother dead —
So stand the nations thine no more.

From room to room those children roam,
Heart-stricken by the unwonted black:
Their house no longer seems their home:
They search; yet know not what they lack.

Years pass: self-will and passion strike
Their roots more deeply day by day;
Old kinsmen sigh; and " how unlike,"
Is all the tender neighbours say.

And yet at moments, like a dream,
A mother's image o'er them flits:
Like hers, their eyes a moment beam;
The voice grows soft, the brow unknits.

Such, Mary, are the realms once thine
That know no more thy golden reign:
Hold forth from heaven thy Babe Divine;
Oh, make thine orphans thine again.