Thro' the garden at morn, in cool emerald gloom,
Wends the sad woman, leaving her lost Savior's tomb,
Swerving on with no look to the skies purple flushed,
Thro' lithe lilies leaning, expectant and hushed.
Her unhooded brow with the dawn pallor shone,
Faring woefully back from the grave and its stone;
When, before the believer, who wept for the dead,
Rose the Master, and just the word "Mary, " he said. Lo! There in the dusk of the whispering palm,
Her raimant all sweet with the spikenard and balm,
The myrtle tops burning with sunlight above
Hung over the sinner, redeemed by His love,
Purer far than the dewdrops upon her dark hair,
Shaken down by the pink-footed doves cooing there,
When the laurel's low Litany suddenly stilled,
At the ringing "Rabboni" her happy heart spilled. Easter cometh, and Magdalene calls us with her,
Thro' gray olive shade, to the Lord's sepulcher,
Where angelic words at the cypress-hid prison,
Linked like dulcimers, say unto us, "He is risen."
Unsandaled and still, with souls all aglow,
Drawing near we see Death, our discomfited foe,
Folding all the fine linen Christ never will need,
With face strangely soft, saying, "Risen, indeed."