"Two"

Two

She toiled up Calvary with her cross― 

Bending beneath its weight, 

Patient, undaunted, to the top 

Nor murmured at her fate. 

She toiled up Calvary with her cross, 

In anguish and in pain; 

The world of men her courage praised 

And cheered―I heard them plain. 

But while men shout her praises loud, 

And flowers at her feet toss, 

Pity, O God, the feebler one 

Who sank beneath her cross. 

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