Angel Visits

“No more of talk where God or angel guestWith man, as with his friend, familiar usedTo sit indulgent and with him partakeRural repast.” Milton.

Are ye for ever to your skies departed?Oh! will ye visit this dim world no more?Ye, whose bright wings a solemn splendour dartedThrough Eden’s fresh and flowering shades of yore!Now are the fountains dried on that sweet spot,And ye--our faded earth beholds you not.

Yet, by your shining eyes not all forsaken,Man wander’d from his Paradise away;Ye, from forgetfulness his heart to waken,Came down, high guests! in many a later day,And with the patriarchs, under vine or oak,Midst noontide calm or hush of evening, spoke.

From you, the veil of midnight darkness rending,Came the rich mysteries to the sleeper’s eye,That saw your hosts ascending and descendingOn those bright steps between the earth and sky:Trembling he woke, and bow’d o’er glory’s trace,And worshipp’d awe-struck, in that fearful place.

By Chebar’s brook ye pass’d, such radiance wearingAs mortal vision might but ill endure;Along the stream the living chariot bearing,With its high crystal arch, intensely pure;And, the dread rushing of your wings that hourWas like the noise of waters in their power.

But in the Olive Mount, by night appearing,Midst the dim leaves, your holiest work was done.Whose was the voice that came divinely cheering,Fraught with the breath of God to aid his Son?--Haply of those that, on the moonlit plains,Wafted good tidings unto Syrian swains.

Yet one more task was Yours! your heavenly dwelling,Ye left, and by th’ unseal’d sepulchral stone,In glorious raiment, sat; the weepers telling,That He they sought had triumph’d and was gone.Now have ye left us for the brighter shore;Your presence lights the lonely groves no more.

But may ye not, unseen, around us hover,With gentle promptings and sweet influence yet.Though the fresh glory of those days be over,When, midst the palm-trees, man your footsteps met?Are ye not near when faith and hope rise high,When love, by strength, o’ermasters agony?

Are ye not near when sorrow, unrepining,Yields up life’s treasures unto Him who gave?When martyrs, all things for His sake resigning,Lead on the march of death, serenely brave?Dreams! But a deeper thought our souls may fill:One, One is near--a spirit holier still!