In a Horse-Car
I WONDERED what power possessed the place
As I took my seat in the motley crowd,
And glancing swiftly from face to face
Of the poor and mean, and the rich and proud,
And all the stages betwixt the two
That daily travel the iron track,
I stopped at a young face fresh as dew,
Framed in white with a hood of black.
'T was a little Sister of Charity;
Oh young and slender, oh sweet and calm!
Like a pensive moonbeam pale was she,
With her fair hands folded palm to palm.
And a delicate beauty of high repose,
A sacred peace, as if far withdrawn
From the hard world’s din, like a cloistered rose,
She blossomed pure as the breath of dawn.
I marveled much how a girl like this
In her Maytime splendor could turn away
From the brimming cup of her youth’s bright bliss,
To succor the sorrowful day by day.
And yet when I looked at her once more,
With her lofty aspect of tempered cheer,
All the joys of the earth seemed vain and poor
To the lovely record written here.
And I felt how true it is, how sure
That every good deed adds a light
To the human face, not there before,
While every ill thing leaves its blight.
It does not follow that women and men
Must live in a cloister to work for God;
There’s enough to do, to the dullest ken,
In the great world’s paths spread wide abroad.
And the good or ill of the life we lead
Is sculptured clear on the countenance;
Be it love and goodness, or sin and greed,
Who runs may read at a single glance.
