Jessie B. Rittenhouse, ed. (1869–1948). The Second Book of Modern Verse. 1922.

Earth’s Easter

EARTH has gone up from its Gethsemane,

And now on Golgotha is crucified;

The spear is twisted in the tortured side;

The thorny crown still works its cruelty.

Hark! while the victim suffers on the tree,

There sound through starry spaces, far and wide,

Such words as in the last despair are cried:

“My God! my God! Thou hast forsaken me!”

But when earth’s members from the cross are drawn,

And all we love into the grave is gone,

This hope shall be a spark within the gloom:

That, in the glow of some stupendous dawn,

We may go forth to find, where lilies bloom,

Two angels bright before an empty tomb.