Once More

LADEN I come to that great Market-Place,
Where still unseen the secret Merchant waits
To take our wares, our hoarded joys and tears
And life and death. Not yet, not yet abates

That greed of his to sweep the harvest in.
Never a hearth or home or child or mate
But He must have it. Let one grain of sand
For hidden building be, one dream elate

With separateness from Him, and He will fold
That thrilling voice of his within the winds.
Sweeter than music, wild as lover’s flute
Piercing the night, his cadence rises, binds

Our willing to his Will. Then, then like fields
Whose ripened grain bows down, like hurrying leaves
When autumn’s magic woos them from the trees,
Once more we strip our wood, we yield our sheaves.