I.

    FRIENDS of faces unknown and a land

    Unvisited over the sea,

    ell me and

    ithe hand

    o be looked at by me, --

    II.

    o ponder and say

    a father can do,

    it fello away

    Out of reache clay

    s press nearer than you.

    III.

    S, or run

    Into ears for relief ?

    O one, --

    Yet my arm s round my otle son,

    And Love kno of Grief.

    IV.

    And I feel  must be and is,

    hen God draws a new angel so

    to his,

    ith a murmur of music, you miss,

    And a rapture of light, you forgo.

    V.

    aring on at the door,

    he face of your angel flashed in,

    t its brightness, familiar before,

    Burns off from you ever the more

    For the dark of your sorrow and sin.

    VI.

    `God lent akes him, you sigh ;

    -- Nay, t me break h your pain :

    God s generous in giving, say I, --

    And thing which he gives, I deny

    t ake back again.

    VII.

    he gives. I appeal

    to all whe hour

    he body we feel

    Rent round us, -- s reveal

    t in power,

    VIII.

    And the babe cries ! -- has each of us known

    By apocalypse (God being there

    Full in nature) the child is our own,

    Life of life, love of love, moan of moan,

    times, everywhere.

    IX.

    he s ours and for ever. Believe,

    O father, look back

    to t loves assurance. to give

    Means