Angel Help.
“ This rare tablet doth include1
Poverty with sanctitude.2
Past midnight this poor maid hath spun,3
And yet the work is not half done,4
Which must supply from earnings scant5
A feeble bed-rid parent’s want.6
Her sleep-charged eyes exemption ask,7
And holy hands take up the task ;8
Unseen the rock and spindle ply,9
And do her earthly drudgery.10
Sleep, saintly poor one, sleep, sleep on ;11
And, waking, find thy labours done.12
Perchance she knows it by her dreams ;13
Her eye hath caught the golden gleams,14
Angelic presence testifying,15
That round her every where are flying ;16
Ostents from which she may presume,17
That much of Heaven is in the room.18
Skirting her own bright hair they run,19
And to the sunny add more sun :20
Now on that aged face they fix,21
Streaming from the crucifix ;22
The flesh-clogg’d spirit disabusing,23
Death-disarming sleeps infusing,24
Prelibations, foretastes high,25
And equal thoughts to live or die.26
Gardener bright from Eden’s bower,27
Tend with care that lily flower ;28
To its leaves and root infuse29
Heaven’s sunshine, Heaven’s dews,30
’Tis a type, and ’tis a pledge,31
Of a crowning privilege.32
Careful as that lily flower,33
This maid must keep her precious dower ;34
Live a sainted maid, or die35
Martyr to virginity.”36