Volume 20 — Requies Mea.
Reading edition
Keep me, sweet love! Thy keeping is my rest.
Not safer feels the eaglet from beneath
The wings that roof the inaccessible nest,
Than I when thou art with me, dearest, best,
Whose love my life is, yea, my very breath!
Thy Son to Egypt fled to prove our faith.
Not Herod's men had snatched him from thy breast,
Or changed his thronèd slumber into death.
How wonderful thy keeping, mighty Queen!
So close, so tender; and as if thine eyes
Had only me to watch, thine arm to screen;
And this inconstant heart were such a prize!
And thou the while, in beatific skies,
Art reigning imperturbably serene!
[pg 360]