God, give content to others; but to me
The throbbing night and bugle-noted day;
No peaceful valleys, but the strong, salt spray
Of some large sea.
Give me no transient pain that frets and stings;
Let me be as the nightingale forlorn,
That, leaning her bruised breast upon a thorn,
Bleeds while she sings.
Give me, O God, not overmuch of sweet;
Let me climb heights and, looking backward, see
My own blood-prints, and know the agony
Of stone-cut feet.
For more and more I feel that not for me
Are little passions and delightful ways;
Only can I thro’ torturing nights and days
Climb up to Thee.
“Give Content to Others” as it appears in Higginson’s The Vanishing Race (1911).