Hail sov’reign love that first began,
The scheme to rescue fallen man;
Hail matchless, free, eternal grace,
That gave my soul a Hiding-Place.

Against the God that rules the sky,
I fought with hands uplifted high;
Despis’d the mentions of his grace,
Too proud to seek a Hiding-Place.

Enwrapt in thick Egyptian night,
And fond of darkness more than light,
Madly I ran the sinful race,
Secure without a Hiding-Place.

But thus the eternal counsel ran,
Almighty Love arrest that man;
I felt the arrows of distress,
And saw that I’d no Hiding-Place.

Indignant Justice stood in view,
To Sina’s fiery mount I flew;
But Justice cry’d with frowning face,
This mountain is no Hiding-Place.

Ere long a Heav’nly voice I heard,
And Mercy’s angel form appear’d,
She led me on with placid pace,
To Jesus as my Hiding-Place.

Should storms of sevenfold thunder roll,
And shake the globe from pole to pole,
No flaming bolt should daunt my face,
For Jesus is my Hiding-Place.

On him almighty vengeance fell,
That must have sunk the world to hell:
He bore it for the chosen race,
And thus became their Hiding-Place.

A few more rolling suns at most,
Shall land us on fair Canaan’s coast,
Where we shall sing the song of grace,
And see our glorious Hiding-Place.

— Major Henry Livingston, Jr., Hiding Place

  From childhood's hour I have not been
        As others were; I have not seen
        As others saw; I could not bring
        My passions from a common spring.
        From the same source I have not taken
        My sorrow; I could not awaken
        My heart to joy at the same tone;
        And all I loved, I loved alone.
        Then- in my childhood, in the dawn
        Of a most stormy life- was drawn
        From every depth of good and ill
        The mystery which binds me still:
        From the torrent, or the fountain,
        From the red cliff of the mountain,
        From the sun that round me rolled
        In its autumn tint of gold,
        From the lightning in the sky
        As it passed me flying by,
        From the thunder and the storm,
        And the cloud that took the form
        (When the rest of Heaven was blue)
        Of a demon in my view.

-- Edgar Allan Poe, Alone

O, gather me the rose, the rose,
   While yet in flower we find it,
For summer smiles, but summer goes,
   And winter waits behind it!

For with the dream foregone, foregone,
   The deed forborne for ever,
The worm, regret, will canker on,
   And time will turn him never.

So well it were to love, my love,
   And cheat of any laughter
The death beneath us and above,
   The dark before and after.

The myrtle and the rose, the rose,
   The sunshine and the swallow,
The dream that comes, the wish that goes,
   The memories that follow!  

-- William Ernest Henley, O, Gather Me The Rose

Every verse is a child of love,
A destitute bastard slip,
A firstling -- the winds above --
Left by the road asleep.
Heart has a gulf, and a bridge,
Heart has a bless, and a grief.
Who is his father? A liege?
Maybe a liege, or a thief.

-- Marina Tsvetaeva, Every Verse Is A Child Of Love

For all, for all! I thank you, o my dear:
For passions' deeply hidden pledge,
For poison of a kiss, and stinging of a tear,
Abuse by friends, and enemies' revenge;
For soul's light, extinguished in a prison,
For things by which I was deceived before.
But do not give me any real reason
To give you thanks from now any more.

-- Mikhael Lermentov, Gratitude