Wedding Poem by David Gray

David Gray

A Golden Wedding Poem.


I.

O Love, whose patient pilgrim feet
 Life's longest path have trod;
Whose ministry hath symbolled sweet
 The dearer love of God,--
The sacred myrtle wreathes again
 Thine altar, as of old;
And what was green with summer, then,
 Is mellowed, now, to gold.

II.

Not now, as then, the Future's face
 Is flushed with fancy's light,
But Memory, with a milder grace,
 Shall rule the feast, to-night.
Blest was the sun of joy that shone,
 Nor less the blinding shower,--
The bud of fifty years agone
 Is love's perfected flower!
III.
O Memory, ope thy mystic door;
 O dream of youth, return;
And let the lights that gleamed of yore
 Beside this altar burn!
The past is plain; 't was love designed
 E'en sorrow's iron chain,
And mercy's shining thread has twined
 With the dark warp of pain.

IV.

So be it, still. O Thou who hast
 That younger bridal blest,
Till the May-morn of love has passed
 To evening's golden west,--
Come to this later Cana, Lord,
 And, at Thy touch divine,
The water of that earlier board
 To-night shall turn to wine.