Poems (Allen)/Endurance

by Elizabeth Chase Allen

ENDURANCE.

OW much the heart may bear, and yet not break!
 How much the flesh may suffer, and not die!
I question much if any pain or ache
 Of soul or body brings our end more nigh:
Death chooses his own time; till that is sworn,
    All evils may be borne.

We shrink and shudder at the surgeon's knife,
 Each nerve recoiling from the cruel steel
Whose edge seems searching for the quivering life,
 Yet to our sense the bitter pangs reveal,
That still, although the trembling flesh be torn,
    This also can be borne.

We see a sorrow rising in our way,
And try to flee from the approaching ill;
We seek some small escape; we weep and pray;
 But when the blow falls, then our hearts are still;
Not that the pain is of its sharpness shorn,
    But that it can be borne.

We wind our life about another life;
 We hold it closer, dearer than our own:
Anon it faints and fails in deathly strife,
 Leaving us stunned, and stricken, and alone;
But ah! we do not die with those we mourn,—
    This also can be borne.

Behold, we live through all things,—famine, thirst,
 Bereavement, pain; all grief and misery,
All woe and sorrow; life inflicts its worst
 On soul and body,—but we cannot die.
Though we be sick, and tired, and faint, and worn,—
    Lo, all things can be borne!