Jones Very (1813–1880)

I CANNOT tell the sorrows that I feel

By the night’s darkness, by the prison’s gloom;

There is no sight that can the death reveal

The spirit suffers in a living tomb;

There is no sound of grief that mourners raise,

No moaning of the wind, or dirge-like sea,

Nor hymns, though prophet tones inspire the lays,

That can the spirit’s grief awake in thee.

Thou too must suffer, as it suffers here,

The death in Christ, to know the Father’s love;

Then in the strains that angels love to hear

Thou too shalt hear the Spirit’s song above,

And learn in grief what these can never tell,

A note too deep for earthly voice to swell.