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Employed a Fact to visit meAnd scuttle my Balloon –

An unpretending timeMy Plane—and I, together wroughtBefore a Builder came—To measure our attainments—Had we the Art of BoardsSufficiently developed—He’d hire usAt Halves—My Tools took Human—Faces—The Bench, where we had toiled—Against the Man—persuaded—We—Temples build—I said—

As absent as a Hundred Years,When it has rode away.

For the long Hindrance—Grace—to Me—With Summers, and with Winters, grow,Some passing Year—A trait bestowTo make Me fairest of the Earth—The Waiting—then—will seem so worthI shall impute with half a painThe blame that I was chosen—then—Time to anticipate His Gaze—It’s first—Delight—and then—Surprise—The turning o’er and o’er my faceFor Evidence it be the Grace—He left behind One…

And in the Handsome SkiesI shall not feel at Home—I know—I don’t like Paradise—Because it’s Sunday—all the time—And Recess—never comes—And Eden’ll be so lonesomeBright Wednesday Afternoons—If God could make a visit—Or ever took a Nap—So not to see us—but they sayHimself—a TelescopePerennial beholds us—Myself would run awayFrom Him—and Holy Ghost—and All—But there’s the ‘Judgement Day’!

Life’s little duties do—precisely—As the very leastWere infinite—to me—I put new Blossoms in the Glass—And throw the old—away—I push a petal from my gownThat anchored there—I weighThe time ’twill be till six o’clockI have so much to do—And yet—Existence—some way back—Stopped—struck—my tickling—through—We cannot put Ourself awayAs a completed ManOr Woman—When the Errand’s doneWe came to…