THE way is steep, and hard to tread, and drear;
Piercing and bleak the icy atmosphere.
My feet are bruised and bleeding, and my eyes
Can only with dim questionings seek the skies.
How could I walk a step without thine aid?
How face the awful silence unafraid?
How bear the star-rays and the moon-glance cold?
Loose not thine hold!
Earth and its kindly ways seem very far,
And yet the shining skies no nearer are;
Except for thee, dear Love, I could not go
Over the hard rocks, the untrodden snow,
But had sat down content with lower things,
With scanty crumbs and waning water-springs,—
A wingèd thing whose wings might not unfold:
Loose not thine hold!
Loose not thine hold! let me feel all the while
The quickening impulse of thy tender smile
Luring me on, and catch, as if in trance,
The lovely reverence of thy downward glance,
The pity and the splendor of thy face,
The recognition like a soft embrace:
Until my feet shall tread the streets of gold,
Loose not thy hold!