GOD IS LOVE

LAURA GERAHTY.

Aye, God is Love! Repeat the restful words
So early learned, so oft, so lightly said.
The backward years, dull with material thought,
Murmuring a self-rebuke for guerdons lost,
Lie in the shadow, as a withered bud
That ne'er unfolds, from rip'ning sunshine hid.

Aye, God is Love! and certes Love is God—
No fearsome Father fashioned in the sky
Of childhood's searchings; hid beyond the clouds
Which, by their very distance, kept Him far—
Not throned in heav'n, where sometime undisturbed
And erstwhile moved by mankind's passionate prayer
He reigns, content, o'er floods of human tears—
No pow'rful potentate manifesting wrath
Which strikes and thunders through a sinful world.
Our God is Love; a gentle tide thus flows
Through all His true reflections, where the soul
Speaks through the stupid flesh in deeds of love,
Healing the wayward thought which seemeth vile.

Love yields the beauty of th'unfolding rose;
The timid luster in the violet's eye;
The songs of birds; peace of the midnight still;
The morning's glory on a storm-swept sea.
Love tends the garden where our purest thoughts
Bloom into deeds of worth and nobleness.
Knowing no sin, no fevered breath or pain,
No selfish motive or inconstancy,
Above a sin-swept world Love reigns supreme,
Where naught else is—for only God is Love!