“If we knew”

May Riley Smith (1842?–1927)

Or, Blessings of To-day

IF we knew the woe and heart-ache

That await us on the road;

If our lips could taste the wormwood,

If our backs could feel the load;

Would we waste to-day in wishing

For a time that ne’er may be?

Would we wait in such impatience

For our ships to come from sea?

If we knew the baby fingers

Pressed against the window-pane

Would be cold and stiff to-morrow,—

Never trouble us again;

Would the bright eyes of our darling

Catch the frown upon our brow?

Would the print of baby fingers

Vex us then as they do now?

Ah! those little ice-cold fingers,

How they point our memories back

To the hasty words and actions

Strewn along the backward track!

How those little hands remind us,

As in snowy grace they lie,

Not to scatter thorns, but roses,

For the reaping by and by.

Strange, we never prize the music

Till the sweet-voiced birds have flown;

Strange, that we should slight the violets

Till the lovely flowers are gone;

Strange, that summer skies and sunshine

Never seem one half so fair

As when winter’s snowy pinions

Shake the white down in the air.

Lips from which the seal of silence

None but God can roll away

Never blossomed in such beauty

As adorns the mouth to-day;

And sweet words that freight our memory

With their beautiful perfume

Come to us in sweeter accents

Through the portals of the tomb.

Let us gather up the sunbeams

Lying all around our path;

Let us keep the wheat and roses,

Casting out the thorns and chaff;

Let us find our sweetest comfort

In the blessings of to-day,

With a patient hand removing

All the briers from the way.

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