"That Other Prayer"

That Other Prayer

Sometimes I kneel when twilight falls, 

And try to ask the Lord 

To lean one moment from above 

And hear my trembling word; 

But scarcely have I knelt, when quick 

Springs that old aching care, 

And with a tremble on my lips, 

I pray that other prayer. 

With that old choke within my throat, 

Those old hot, useless tears, 

With which I used to kneel and say 

That prayer in other years; 

With the same beating of my heart, 

Bowed by the same fierce care, 

And the old tremble on my lips, 

I pray that other prayer. 

 

It was not answered―nay; and I 

Now would not have it so, 

And that is why God heard it not, 

And it was best, yet, oh! 

So often in that sky-lit room 

With walls so cold and bare, 

With that poor tremble on my lips, 

I prayed that other prayer! 

And so, tho’ it was answered not, 

And old desire is dead, 

I cannot kneel these happier nights 

Beside this other bed, 

But the quick choke comes to my throat, 

Vibrant to that old care, 

And ere I know, with trembling lips, 

I’ve prayed that other prayer! 

"That Other Prayer" as it appears in Ella Higginson's When the Birds Go North Again (1898).