My Virtual Reading Room

The Life To Come

There is a City where God's happy children
Shall tread forever burnished floors, they say,
But I shall beg to walk in Oxford meadows
Where dance the golden flowers of May.

I cannot dream of walls upbuilt of jasper,
Nor can the gates of pearl the heart suffice;
Who once beholds the rainbows in the dewdrop
Has seen a pearl of greater price.

And when the harpers in that land are making
Strange melodies on earth unheard before,
If I might only hear once more Beethoven,
Then I should ask of God no more.

(Edward Shillito)