Classic Poem

Here rest the thin worn hands which fondled Him,
The trembling lips which magnified the Lord,
Who looked upon His handmaid, the young, slim
Mary at her meek tasks, and here the sword
Within the soul of her whose anguished eyes
Gazed at the stars which watch Gethsemane,
And saw the sun fail in the stricken skies.
In these dim rooms she guards the treasury
Of her white memories—the strange, sweet face
More marred than any man's, the tender, fain
And eager words, the wistful human grace,
The mysteries of glory, joy and pain,
And that hope tremulous, half-sob, half-song,
Ringing through night—“How long, O Lord, how long?”