Alfred H. Miles, ed. The Sacred Poets of the Nineteenth Century. 1907.
By Original Hymns. II. Throned upon the awful TreeJohn Ellerton (18261893)
T
King of grief, I watch with Thee
Darkness veils Thine anguished face,
None its lines of woe can trace,
None can tell what pangs unknown
Hold Thee silent and alone.
Wrestling with the evil powers;
Left alone with human sin,
Gloom around Thee and within,
Till the appointed time is nigh,
Till the Lamb of God may die.
Upward through the whelming cloud
Thou, the Father’s only Son,
Thou, His own Anointed One,
Thou dost ask Him—can it be?
Why hast Thou forsaken Me?
Darkly o’er my sinful soul,
Thou, who once wast thus bereft
That Thine own might ne’er be left—
Teach me by that bitter cry
In the gloom to know Thee nigh.