Within a Wall
Once in a time when skies were gray
I chanced to walk in a cloistered way,
I saw the ones who closed the door
On all the world had spread before.
Their eyes—that were closed to the joy of good,
They thought the God’s law they understood.
O Pity, Pity, for such as they
Who only look on skies of gray,
From cloistered windows sad of eye,
When all about is glorious sky.
It was but the tiny patch of gray,
The shadowed thing that happened to play
Behind the back of the glorious earth.
Alas, they thought it was all the worth
Of the whole wide world, the glorious world.
But the folded wings were not unfurled
And closed to use they lost the call,
And so they lost to them their all.