To his Watch
By Gerard Manley Hopkins
Mortal my mate, bearing my rock-a-heart
Warm beat with cold beat company, shall I
Earlier or you fail at our force, and lie
The ruins of, rifled, once a world of art?
The telling time our task is; time's some part,
Not all, but we were framed to fail and die -
One spell and well that one. There, ah thereby
Is comfort's carol of all or woe's worst smart.
Field-flown the departed day no morning brings
Saying 'This was yours' with her, but new one, worse.
And then that last and shortest . . .