IF WE HAD THE TIME.


If I had the time to find a place
And sit me down full face to face
With my better self, that cannot show
In my daily life that rushes so:
It might be then I would see my soul
Was stumbling still towards the shining goal,
I might be nerved by the thought sublime,--
If I had the time!

If I had the time to let my heart
Speak out and take in my life a part,
To look about and to stretch a hand
To a comrade quartered in no-luck land;
Ah, God! If I might but just sit still
And hear the note of the whip-poor-will,
I think that my wish with God's would rhyme--
If I had the time!

If I had the time to learn from you
How much for comfort my word could do;
And I told you then of my sudden will
To kiss your feet when I did you ill;
If the tears aback of the coldness feigned
Could flow, and the wrong be quite explained,--
Brothers, the souls of us all would chime,
If we had the time!