CONSOLATION by Frances E. Bolton

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Mountain View, California · Jul 12, 1905

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 31, No. 28.

CONSOLATION.

By Frances E. Bolton

BY FRANCES E. BOLTON.

I SAT at my organ in sorrow one day, And my fingers passed over the keys; But the music was minor, the chords were dismay, And the theme was life's strange mysteries. My sad heart played echoes of shoutings of war, The anguish of women for death, And pictured the fields where the slain lay afar, Unburied and silent in Lethe.

In wild improvision I pictured earth's loss,— Love's chords that were quivering with pain, And friendship's harp broken, and hearts crushed 'neath cross, And the links of life's bonds burst in twain. The wild, terrible sorrow of all that has been, Swept under my fingers that day, And my heart helpless echoed the strange, hopeless din, And sobbed, Shall it be so alway?

Will Peace never brood with an outstretched white wing? Will friendship be ever ajar? Will love's roses ever leave aught but a sting? And earth be but planet for war? Then came God's sweet promise that seemed to retard, That bade me look up through earth's gloom, "The world shall be filled with the love of the Lord, And the wastes of the desert shall bloom."

Then O, like the song of an angel above, Like psalm from the unblemished spheres, There swept from my organ sweet measures of love, That eased my sad heart into tears. Some heavenly harper struck straight through my dole With comfort I never had known, In high notes celestial that spoke to my soul Of the Lord who should come for His own.

The tumult of war would forever be o'er, Love's roses have never a sting, The earth to its first pristine glory restore By the word of our Saviour and king; Affliction no more would God's beauty deface, Love's treasure alone be outpoured, And there flooded sweet music through earth and all space Like the sound of the singer's last chord.