Beneath the burning eastern sky
 The Cross was raised at morn:
The widowed Church to weep stood by,
 The world, to hate and scorn.

Now, journeying westward, evermore
 We know the lonely Spouse
By the dear mark her Saviour bore
 Traced on her patient brows.

At Rome she wears it, as of old
 Upon th' accursed hill:
By monarchs clad in gems and gold,
 She goes a mourner still.

She mourns that tender hearts should bend
 Before a meaner shrine,
And upon Saint or Angel spend
 The love that should be thine.

By day and night her sorrows fall
 Where miscreant hands and rude
Have stained her pure ethereal pall
 With many a martyr's blood.

And yearns not her parental heart,
 To hear THEIR secret sighs,
Upon whose doubting way apart
 Bewildering shadows rise?

Who to her side in peace would cling,
 But fear to wake, and find
What they had deemed her genial wing
 Was Error's soothing blind.

She treasures up each throbbing prayer:
 Come, trembler, come and pour
Into her bosom all thy care,
 For she has balm in store.

Her gentle teaching sweetly blends
 With this clear light of Truth
The aerial gleam that Fancy lends
 To solemn thoughts in youth. -

If thou hast loved, in hours of gloom,
 To dream the dead are near,
And people all the lonely room
 With guardian spirits dear,

Dream on the soothing dream at will:
 The lurid mist is o'er,
That showed the righteous suffering still
 Upon th' eternal shore.

If with thy heart the strains accord,
 That on His altar-throne
Highest exalt thy glorious Lord,
 Yet leave Him most thine own;

Oh, come to our Communion Feast:
 There present, in the heart
As in the hands, th' eternal Priest
 Will His true self impart. -

Thus, should thy soul misgiving turn
 Back to the enchanted air,
Solace and warning thou mayst learn
 From all that tempts thee there.

And, oh! by all the pangs and fears
 Fraternal spirits know,
When for an elder's shame the tears
 Of wakeful anguish flow,

Speak gently of our sister's fall:
 Who knows but gentle love
May win her at our patient call
 The surer way to prove?