God answers sharp and sudden on some prayers, And thrusts the thing we have prayed for in our face, A gauntlet with a gift in't. - Elizabeth Barrett Browning

The heart which, like a staff, was one For mine to lean and rest upon, The strongest on the longest day With steadfast love, is caught away, And yet my days go on, go on. And cold before my summer's done, And deaf in Nature's general tune, And fallen too low for special fear, And here, with hope no longer here, While the tears drop, my days go on.

And if God choose
I shall but love thee better after death.

"Guess now who holds thee?"—"Death," I said. But there
The silver answer rang—"Not Death, but Love."