Worship

I WANDERED down the dim-lit forest aisles,
With brooding eyes and reverent slow feet;
I saw the quiet arches overmeet,
More fair than mediæval-builded piles.
I traced the shadowy cathedral lines,
And heard the tiny choristers repeat
Their Benedicite, upsinging sweet
Above the surging octaves of the pines.
Most holy high Cathedral of the Wood,
Whose doors are ever open night and day,
That they who will may enter, it is good
In thy great nave to linger and to pray ;
Thence from the silence and the solitude
To go ennobled on the daily way.

Edith C. Banfield.