Helen Hunt Jackson

Doubt

They bade me cast the thing away,
They pointed to my hands all bleeding,
They listened not to all my pleading;
    The thing I meant I could not say;
    I knew that I should rue the day
    If once I cast that thing away.
 
    I grasped it firm, and bore the pain;
The thorny husks I stripped and scattered;
If I could reach its heart, what mattered
    If other men saw not my gain,
    Or even if I should be slain?
    I knew the risks; I chose the pain.
 
    O, had I cast that thing away,
I had not found what most I cherish,
A faith without which I should perish.
    The faith which, like a kernel, lay
    Hid in the husks which on that day
    My instinct would not throw away.
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